Zen and the Art of War
by CeriseReve
Summary: 2,600 Years, 186 Spies, 2 Hostages, and 1 Moral Dilemma.  An AU casefic follow up to The Janus List that explores how it could be possible for Colby to work with the FBI team again.
1. Tomorrow’s Sunrise

**Title:** Zen and the Art of War  
**Author:** CeriseReve  
**Summary:** Zen and the Art of War is an AU case-fic follow up to The Janus List that explores how it could be possible for Colby to work with the FBI team again.  
**Spoilers:** Everything through the Janus List. Although it does not play a large factor, this fic assumes some of the background found in my other stories: Daisy Irrationality, Greedy Rationality, and Double.  
**Acknowledgments:** Special thanks to Zubeneschamali and Laura for their willingness to beta.  
**Disclaimer:** I do not own any of the Numb3rs characters because they were created by Nicolas Falacci and Cheryl Heuton. This story is strictly for fun not profit. It is also a complete work of fiction. 

**Zen and the Art of War**

2,600 Years  
186 Spies  
2 Hostages  
1 Moral Dilemma 

** Chapter I: Tomorrow's Sunrise **

Still wearing his Aviator sunglasses Don yanked open his top desk drawer and rummaged for the bottle of Extra Strength Tylenol he knew should be there. He came up empty unearthing old phone messages, report folders, packs of gum, and several dried out blue ballpoint pens. Frustrated he banged the drawer closed and winced when the pain in his head jumped tenfold.

A moment later he opened his eyes to the still too harsh fluorescent light. It didn't help that one of the tubes high overhead kept flickering irregularly trying to thwart death for a few more seconds. He'd have to report that to maintenance after he found something to cut down the pain. At this point he wasn't picky: Aspirin, Aleve, Advil, Motrin, Morphine….

Too bad he couldn't get that over the counter.

He started to go over to the desk next to his, but halfway there he realized it was Colby's desk; he turned and pawed through the one behind him. Triumphant, he found a bottle of Midol when he pulled open the bottommost drawer.

He wasn't that desperate. Was he?

The sickly light fluttered again and—giving in—he reached for the bottle. Nothing rattled inside. Who keeps an empty bottle in their desk? Megan, obviously.

Resigned to the pounding in his head he head he tossed the Midol bottle into trash and dropped into his office chair. Head in his hands he rubbed his aching temples. It was a mistake to have had the extra shot after Dad and Charlie had gone up to bed.

It was only 6 o'clock in the morning on Saturday—the last day of one of the worst weeks of his life—and he didn't think the morning was going to get any better than the evening before. The sun, flush above the horizon now, made him wish for the starry night sky. Darkness is man's innocence and his had cracked more deeply less than twelve hours before. Thankfully the office was still quiet with only a few overworked, early bird Agents settling in for the day. He could hear them chattering about child molestation and bribery at the edge of his consciousness while he stared at the waste basket. Consciousness with a hangover is extremely overrated.

Steeling himself he took a deep breath and swung his chair around and faced Colby's desk—correction—Agent Granger's _former_ desk. They'd never be on a first name basis again; it was too personal, too friendly. As much as Granger's betrayal and the sunlight hurt it was better not to be in the dark. If that became his new mantra, perhaps he'd believe it.

How in the hell had _this_ happened? Why in the hell had this happened to _him_? He massaged his temples again, wishing this was all a nightmare and he'd wake grumpy and glaring at his alarm clock.

He'd trusted the man. He'd trusted the man with his life multiple times. With Charlie's life! God, how could he have read the situation so wrong? He didn't even want to imagine the report some high up flunky was going to write that plastered him in a bad light.

Flicker. Flicker.

When she returned from her assignment in El Paso, Liz would no doubt tell him it wasn't his fault. But it was because he was the one in charge and he'd failed to realize who he was in charge of.

There was a framed photo of his team resting on Granger's desk. Charlie had given them out as holiday gifts last December. He remembered Charlie insisting on taking it one night when they were all over at the house celebrating the conclusion of a case. He couldn't remember which one anymore, but there they all were with wide, beaming smiles. Granger even had his arms draped over David and Megan's shoulders.

Flickkkker.

The light whimpered and finally died; Don pushed the photo face down so he wouldn't have to remember the fake past. He heard a crack and didn't care.

"Morning," Megan said quietly behind him.

"Good morning," he replied.

"Is it?"

With his pounding head, fractured team, and the impending arrival of the Assistant Director Dolon it was far from approaching anything masquerading as good. So it was probably better not to answer that question. Megan had pulled her hair into a haphazard pony tail and while her appearance was, as usual, immaculate her eyes were puffy and she wasn't wearing any mascara. "You're here early."

"I wanted to make sure I saw you first thing," she said not looking at him, but rather around the office bullpen drinking everything in.

"Get a good night's sleep?"

"No. You?"

"Hardly." Then she handed him the perfectly creased letter she had clutched in her hands. "What's this?" he asked without opening it.

"My letter of resignation."

Dumbstruck, he nearly dropped it. Fractured team, indeed. After several heartbeats, he tried to hand it back to her, but she wouldn't take it back. "Please tell me you're joking," he said. His voice came out in a croaked whisper.

"Don, I've thought about this all night."

"It was a bad night."

"Have you truly thought through what you are going to do once I turn this," he brandished the paper, "in? What are you going to do then?"

She blinked at him and hesitated before she said, "I don't know." She scanned the bullpen again avoiding his eyes and his question. There seemed to be a breakthrough in the molestation case.

"Look, I know you're reeling right now. I am, David is, Col—" That man was no longer on his team; he was no longer Don's responsibility. "It was a bad night," he repeated. "I don't want you to regret this in six months time. All I'm asking is for you to wait." He returned the letter, still unopened, to her hand. This time she took it. "I need you to wait."

_I need you. _

"Wait for what? You know exactly how I spent the past six weeks away in Washington. I'm not sure if, in good faith, I can continue to work for a government that… the United States isn't a nation like…" she trailed off.

Like China. The unsaid word hung between them like an albatross.

"Megan, do you want to quit for moral reasons, or because of Agent Granger's betrayal?"

"All my life I felt like I was on the outside. Joining the FBI gave me a family and a team I could trust. When I said that yesterday to," she shook her head and changed tacks, "I used to be a part of something larger and I'm starting to realize it was a lie."

"Hey," he led her to her desk chair and, like a lost little lamb, she sat. He pulled his own in close, leaned forward, and took her hands—the letter still clutched in them—in his. "It isn't a lie," he said softly. "Megan, you are the strongest person I know. You are also an agent, who works for one of the strongest, powerful organizations I know. You belong here and you make a difference. I know things look bad right now, but we'll get through it. This was a bad week."

"And how many more bad weeks will there be?"

"And how many more good weeks will there be?" he countered.

"How many more," she glanced to Granger's desk and the flipped over picture fame, "friends will we lose?"

"He's a spy." Was he ever going to get use to saying that? Growing up Don believed a spy was someone noble, someone brave, someone who did what was necessary to take down the bad guys: James Bond sophisticated and twice as cool. He may have romanticized Ashby's life and work, but the previous sleepless night and the ensuing headache had driven home the point that spies choose sides. And there are spies on the wrong side of the battle too. "He wasn't a friend," Don continued aloud. "It may be unbelievably selfish, but I need you to stay. I need your friendship, even if it is just for a little while longer," he gently squeezed her hands. "Take the day off. Go see Larry. You said you haven't seen him since he landed."

"Because I was working for West—" she cut off the name.

"Yeah. Take the day for yourself."

"What about the debriefing interviews?" she asked and he could tell she was trying to cling to a reason why she shouldn't take the gift of a day off. "I thought the Assistant Director was flying in specifically to oversee the situation."

"He is," Don said and took off his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose. Even with the light above off the room was still over bright. He didn't need to be reminded of the fact he needed oversight. He was use to being in charge and it was going to be shameful to be so forcibly reminded that he screwed up. Royally. "David and I will take ours. I'll reschedule yours for tomorrow.

"We should do it together," she protested and blinked back the tears welling in her eyes.

"We'll manage," he said closing the subject. "I want you to promise me something."

She sniffed. "What?"

"Promise me that you'll wait two full weeks before giving me your letter of resignation back."

"Morning!" David said full of false cheer as he dropped a set of keys onto his desk.

That jerked the two of them apart. Don hadn't realized they were that close. Megan spun around in her chair and wiped her eyes with the back of her hand.

"I see you also needed to get to the office early this morning," Don commented to draw David's attention to him while Megan got herself back under control.

"Where else would I be on a weekend? Besides, compared to you two it seems as if I'm a bit late."

The large hand on the wall clock had barely nudged past the six. "Hardly," Megan replied. "I just came in to make sure I could have the day off." She took her letter and stuffed it into the still open drawer. "I'll see you tomorrow."

"Monday," Don corrected.

"Tomorrow. That is unless _you_ were planning on taking Sunday off."

Far from it. He gave her a tight smile. "If you promise me, then I'll declare a truce." Don caught the puzzled look on David's face, but ignored it.

"I'll… I promise I'll think about it."

"That's all I ask."

Megan scurried to the elevator and as soon as she was out of earshot David asked, "Is she alright?"

"I don't know."

David cleared his throat, "Last night when we retrieved Dwayne Carter, she said she 'couldn't do this anymore.'"

"I know."

"Oh," David said flatly.

"I've given her the day off. I hope she's going to see Fleinhardt."

"Ah."

With his freshly trimmed beard and defiant stance David looked like he'd weathered the night in a better fashion that either he or Megan. "You still with me?"

"Yes." No doubt, no hesitation. "You?"

Don gave a curt nod. "Yes."

"Good. What assignment do you have for me, boss?"

That meant a lot and as David had been with him the longest he was certain the other man knew it. "I figured you and I should do some background searching on Granger."

"Then isn't it convenient that I," David picked up the keys he'd tossed on the desk a few moments before and jangled the keys in the space between, "just happen to have a set of spare keys to Colby's apartment."

"And isn't it also very convenient that Assistant Director Dolon isn't due for a few hours yet," Don replied.

Both men looked each other in the eye, but neither smiled.

"I figure we've got two hours, three tops." Don strode over to Granger's desk, picked the photo up, and set it upright. The glass was indeed fractured through the middle in a thick slash. "And before I have to face the music, I want some answers."

"So do I," David agreed.

Don pulled out his cell. "Your phone off?"

"Yeah."

"Good. I've got a call to make and then I'll turn mine off as well." He grabbed his sunglasses and put them on. The darkened tint may not have been rosy, but it did make the situation and the pounding in his head bearable. Phone to his ear he headed to the elevator with David close on his heels. Neither looked back at the empty pairs of desks they left behind.

-oOo-

She lived.

Naomi Vaughn had lived. He didn't kill her, couldn't kill her, and that wasn't something Colby was going to allow himself to forget. Was that a benediction or reproach? At this point did it even matter?

It was the first time in his life he hadn't followed an order be it one from his father, one from his commanding officer, one from his boss, or one from his handler. His years of training insisted he was guilty, but caught in the middle of two conflicting orders—Westwood's and Don's—he'd made his choice even if the generations before him would gladly disown him.

He wasn't the same soldier anymore. He wasn't the same man and if he was guilty of protecting an innocent woman, then may he be damned for it.

He wouldn't be the one to kill Naomi Vaughn.

The room was square with plain, grey walls and a low ceiling. He sat on the cot that lined the wall kitty-corner from the urinal. The only other amenity in the room was a stout table and two chairs.

A cell was a cell, but it was a palace compared to his rat infested cell in China. He shook his head to dispel the memory and leaned his head against the cool concrete. He covered his mouth with the palm of his hand and mouthed the word alive against his own lifeline. Alive! She was alive and so was he. Colby closed his eyes and tried—not that it had worked the first dozen times he'd attempted it—to lull himself to sleep with sheer will power.

He drew his knees up close to his chest and concentrated on regulating his breathing pattern. Eventually he dozed off fighting nightmares best locked deep away. When the cell door clanged open sometime later for a half a heartbeat Colby expected Mr. Wang to step in.

He wasn't sure if he was relieved or not, when his handler Victor Westwood and Assistant Director Michael Dolon entered instead. Without a watch or clock his grip on time was starting to slip, but by the tired expressions on his visitors' faces it must have been early. Probably just after sunrise. Very early.

And yet it was also way too late for his soul.

"Good morning, Lieutenant Granger," Westwood greeted him. His old title was a slap in the face and he tried not to bristle. So much for burying the past.

"Sir," he replied saying nothing further and not moving from his position on the bed since he didn't trust his voice not to crack or his legs to stay steady.

Westwood was tall and imposing with close cropped hair kept out of military habit, while Dolon was far shorter and fair-headed. They made opposite bookends of each other and he pitied the person who tried to pull them apart. Despite an antagonistic history, when the NSA and FBI cooperated they won. These were powerful men, who ruled kingdoms. If he never saw those two particular men and their slick suits again it would be too soon; they played strings and he was their puppet.

"I apologize for the inconvenience of your arrest," Dolon began without further preamble, "but it will be necessary to keep you here a bit longer while we arrange for your release."

Colby made sure to keep his face impassive and project an image of serenity. He wasn't about to get his hopes for release up. It was a cruel lie he'd just as soon not relive. "And how are you arranging my release?" Colby asked trying to keep the skepticism out of his voice.

Dolon pulled out one of the chairs at the metal table and sat down. Westwood did the same with the other. While they both turned their chairs to face him Colby scooted his knees down flat on the bed. It was almost like a cozy chat, except for the video camera in the corner and the industrial strength lock on the door.

"It's off," Dolon said following his glance at the camera.

Colby nodded.

"We're still working the exact details," Westwood explained running a hand through his balding hair, "but the general consensus is that we're going to drop all charges against you and release you. It is going to be a giant misunderstanding, the incoherent rambling and unfounded accusations of an old, useless man. You are too valuable an Agent to keep locked up."

He was too valuable? He managed, just barely, not to snort.

"It took a bit of time to get on top of everything, but you did exactly what you should have. That will aid things considerably," Dolon added.

The praise was cold comfort indeed. "And I go back to my life as if nothing happened?" If only it was simple as that. He'd effectively lied to his friends periodically for two years and in the past week extensively. It would be months before he could blink and not see David and Don's hardened expressions as they held him at gun point. "I was arrested and interrogated by my own team."

"Which is most unfortunate, but there will be no official record of the events concerning your involvement in the past week's events. Do not worry, you will be cleared," Dolon assured him.

Name cleared perhaps, but his reputation would be an entirely different story. Nothing could be that simple. "I'm not sure that's possible."

"Anything's possible," Westwood said, "you of all people should know that implicitly."

"Do you want to go back to your team?" Dolon asked.

"Which team would that be?" Colby asked and felt his eyebrows rise.

"Your FBI team of course."

"I doubt they'd allow themselves to work with me."

"Very well. I will personally see to it that the transfer request you will put in next week is speedily approved," said Dolon. Then he turned to address Westwood. "I'd suggest an overseas location. Now that Carter has been completely removed from the equation, we can open a spot in our Beijing attaché office. His connections and experience would be invaluable in that role."

"I concur," Westwood agreed.

No mess, no fuss, no choice. They'd arranged his future just like they'd guided his past. Dining on authentic Chinese food for months on end did not appeal. Neither would the climate of endless espionage. His previous visit—if you could call it that—wasn't one he cared to repeat, or remember.

Before Colby could come up with an eloquent way to suggest another course of action, Westwood gave him his next assignment. "When Consulate General Chen contacts you, and he will shortly, you are to stress your importance and make mention of your upcoming plans. You are also instructed to attempt to sell Ashby's sham of a Janus List."

Sham?

"I must say, Agent Granger, I'm quite impressed with your behavior. You've handled this very difficult situation very well," Dolon said and Westwood nodded in agreement.

As if he needed their approval. "I was well taught," he said directly to Westwood.

"Yes, you were."

Don's interrogation couldn't hold a candle to Army Special Force's training and Chinese methods of persuasion and interrogation. He'd deliberately projected an air of resigned, restrained detachment last night. He'd provoked Don, roused David to violence, and sent Megan's profiling skills into overdrive; he'd played his friends just like these men played him.

"Let's put the future to rest for now. Can you brief us on the events of the past two days?" Dolon asked.

Colby cleared his throat and began the report he'd been preparing for. "Four months ago I attended a meeting with Chen. He was in the process of attempting to bargain down Dwayne Carter's threat assessment and asked for my assistance. I relayed this information through the proper channels." Colby gestured to Westwood. "As ordered I made personal contact again with Ashby two weeks later."

"How did you find the man?"

"Paranoid and angry about his termination from Black Rain."

"Despite his usefulness Alistair MacClair always was short sided," Westwood muttered, "Go on."

"Ashby was suspicious, but willing to cooperate. After laying the foundation, I was ordered to take no further action until commanded to do so. A week from yesterday I received a call to watch Ashby for any overly suspicious action, maintain my cover, and prevent the release of the Janus List using deadly force if necessary."

"What happened next?" Dolon asked.

"Ashby blew up the Sixth Street Bridge."

Neither man even cracked a smile. Be dry. Stick to the facts he reminded himself. "As the investigation proceeded it was apparent that Ashby had made contact with a reporter at the LA Ledger. Megan Reeves and I were assigned to assure Naomi Vaughn's protection. Last night Reeves had taken out two of Black Rain's gunman when I left to retrieve Ms. Vaughn from the back of the house. We went down the stairs towards the beach and that's where they apprehended me."

"You claimed you were removing her from the fire zone?" With that wording Dolon revealed that he must have read the transcript of yesterday evening's interrogation.

"Yes."

"And your team didn't believe you?"

"No," he replied and it was plain neither man was pleased with this turn of events.

"What did you reveal in the course of their questioning?"

"They know I planted the Chinese bug in Ashby's apartment two years ago and that I removed it earlier this week."

"They don't know of anymore of your relationship with the Chinese?"

"With the exception of my involvement with Dwayne Carter, no. They didn't ask for a motivation."

"Sloppy of them," Westwood murmured.

"And lucky for us," Dolon said. "Then you pinned the release of the Janus List on Carter rather than on us?"

"I pointed out who gained in the situation. Don Eppes made the leap as to whom. I didn't contradict him." Colby crossed his arms across his chest and then quickly uncrossed them once he'd realized he'd done so. "I'd imagine Dwayne wasn't pleased about it."

"We left him an hour ago metaphorically spitting tacks," Westwood revealed. "Plus he blames you for being unable to kill the reporter. He believes you failed. Do you think so?"

He wouldn't say yes to that.

"Why hadn't you eliminated the reporter beforehand?" Dolon pushed when Colby didn't answer immediately.

"I… I never had an opportunity alone with her before the Black Rain ops moved in." Careful not to allow his posture or eye movements give him away Colby continued, "I was unable to complete the mission I was assigned."

"That is a pity," Westwood sighed and leaned back to cross an ankle over one knee. "MacClair jumped the gun and knows it. We'll have to lean on him, but I don't expect that he'll sit still for long once he has confirmation we do indeed have some facsimile of the Janus List. We'll have to see what can be arranged. She is still a large liability."

"I am not convinced she ever knew anything about the Janus List," Colby cut in. "Ashby choose her as a conduit, but she never knew any of the names, details, or country affiliations of our agents and spies."

"Is that why you didn't kill her?" Westwood said sharply.

"I didn't kill her because I didn't have a prime opportunity," he lied smoothly. Opportunities, yes. Prime ones, no. And, direct order or not, she didn't need to die in cold blood for something she was caught in the middle of and couldn't understand, unlike he who understood with terrifying clarity.

"I do have to hand it to Ashby; he went for maximum impact and maximum coverage once he pieced together what we were planning." Westwood sounded almost awed.

"What makes you say that?" the Assistant Director asked.

"I did a bit of digging on Ms. Vaughn," Westwood elaborated. "Taylor Ashby, as unbalanced as he's been in the past few years, didn't choose the woman on a whim. He found someone with a background in government corruption and civil rights." No wonder she was so offended with Megan's slurs about dates and hair appointments. "She's quite the spitfire. She's spent some time in India and most recently Africa and returned to Los Angeles in late 2001. "The FBI brought in outside help to work on this case, correct?" Westwood asked letting the subject of Naomi Vaughn drop. Colby had no illusions about it being forgotten.

"A bit of an unconventional relationship I admit, but it's been fruitful," Dolon said and started to tap his foot on the floor.

"Who did they bring in?"

"Professor Charles Eppes of CalSci."

"Eppes?"

"Charlie Eppes is Don Eppes' brother," Colby added.

"Brother…. Well, that's another complication I'm not pleased about. He has the proper clearances, correct?"

"For the past several years," Dolon said. "I'm surprised you haven't heard of him before, Victor, he's done extensive work for both the FBI and NSA. Apparently, Ashby asked specifically to speak with Professor Eppes," Dolon raised his eyebrows at Colby as a question.

Colby nodded. "They spoke on the bridge and later again at the hospital."

Westwood stroked his chin in thought. "Perhaps we can use that to our advantage. I'll assign my assistant, Markenson, to work out the details."

"Are you sure that is wise?" Dolon asked.

"What?" Westwood blinked. "You don't?"

"We'll discuss this later."

Colby felt his heart sink in his chest, but wisely held his tongue. There wasn't anyone he could warn, assuming they were willing to listen in the first place.

"Do you have any insight on the man that may make our decision easier?" Westwood asked him.

He wanted a read on Charlie? He had to consciously concentrate on not fidgeting with the bedsheets. "The man's brilliant. He's able to find connections and analyze problems like no one I've ever met before."

"We need all the analysis we can get," Westwood muttered. "And the brother?"

"Don'll see my perceived betrayal as a person affront. Despite his authority he is perceived by every member of his team as a friend. He may emotionally avoid the situation, but professionally he'll attack it like a pit bull. In order for my release to be successful you'll need to have his cooperation."

"If he is removed, who would take his place?"

Colby swallowed. "Megan Reeves."

"Not Sinclair? Hasn't he been with Eppes the longest?" Dolon asked.

"No," Colby shook his head, "David may have been on the team an extra year, but Megan has more seniority. She's also just returned from an assignment with the DOJ and–"

"I'm well aware of her recent return to Los Angeles," Westwood cut him off. "She's an excellent profiler."

"One of the best," Colby agreed. That was interesting. What had Megan been doing for the man?

"Does Agent Eppes have any weaknesses that we could exploit?"

No!

No, absolutely not. He wasn't going to sell Charlie to them.

"Granger?" Westwood prompted.

Then again…he tilted his head to the side as if to seriously consider the question. They wouldn't ask if they didn't already know the answer. He suddenly felt very, very cold when he realized this was another test. "A great source of his strength is his family."

"That's what our analysis of the situation was as well. Thank you for the confirmation."

And thank you for proving you're a cold-hearted bastard.

Assistant Director Dolon checked his watch and got to his feet. "We have other matters that we must attend to which are time critical. Do you have any further questions?"

"May I ask what is going to happen to Dwayne?"

"He is no longer your concern," Westwood replied curtly also getting to his feet.

Conversation closed in other words and Colby was smart enough not to push it.

"In the meantime, is there anything we can bring…to make your stay more comfortable?" Dolon asked.

A decent meal, a shower, a shave, and a tunnel out of this godforsaken cell of memories. He didn't think they'd allow him out of the cell for any of those things. "Something to do maybe? A chess set?"

"I'll see what I can do," Victor Westwood assured him. "Again, we apologize for the inconvenience."

At least there was no blood involved in this interview; Colby clenched his right hand several times to convince himself nothing was broken. Lying back down on the bed he had one question running through his mind. Could he tell the difference between an interrogation and interview, or between war and peace?

Was there a difference?

-oOo-


	2. Birds of a Feather

** Chapter II: Birds of a Feather **

"It's a war."

Charlie watched as Amita flipped the piece of paper over and scribbled a large B- at the top. "What?" she asked absentmindedly and reached for her next exam to grade.

"It's a war," he repeated and sat next to her at the dining room table, "It's a never ending war of attrition."

"How so?"

"The exams, they keep coming and coming and coming."

"I'm sure our students see it that way too." Amita nibbled the end of her pen and returned to her marking.

"This is only your first full of year of teaching. You'll see the light and change your mind." He was in for a long, tedious day. There was nothing exciting about passing judgment on his students' work, especially since he got to see the places where he failed his students. And after the successful failure of the previous case he didn't need the additional reminder of his weaknesses. If the past week had been a test then he wasn't sure he passed with flying colors.

"If you say so. However, I seem to remember being your hapless TA and grading your exams for years."

"What do you say we roll the clock back a bit and you take over again?"

"Not. A. Chance," she said and glared. "I happen to quite like the current status of our relationship." He felt his cheeks warm with a blush and knew he was a fool to even give voice to the irrational suggestion. "Besides we have work to do and," she continued in a lighter tone, "it's not my fault William's mother died last week." Or that we heard Colby's name come out of Naomi Vaughn's voice mail system was the undercurrent.

He moved his gaze to the stack of exams before him; it was nearly paper ream thick. He slid off the paperclip binding the first set of tests together and bent the lightweight metal backwards. "He flew to Virginia." Colby would probably see the inside of a high security Virginia prison cell.

"I know."

"He left me to grade my own exams."

She rolled her eyes. "I know."

"My own TA left me," he moped, tossed the mangled paperclip to the table, and rested his chin on his hands.

"I know." Amita checked her watch. "Don't worry it'll all be over in about six hours."

He lounged back in his chair and figured he should try for charming. "What do you say we take a break?"

"If you bat your eyelashes at me one more time, I'll be forced to take drastic action." She picked up a spare pen, pried open his hand, and curled his fingers around pen. It was cold. "Grade. Or you'll never finish."

Resigned to a fate of red ink, he pulled the top exam off the pile. At least Jeremy Durkin had remembered to write his name on the test. He scanned the rest of the page and a quick glance assured him that there wasn't much else to praise about Mr. Durkin's penmanship. He sighed. Four in the afternoon seemed very far away. It was almost enough to make him yearn for a FBI case and dead body.

Charlie heard the stairs creek behind him and peaked over his shoulder to see his father enter the room with a chipper smile. Uggg! If his father started whistling a merry tune, he'd be forced to take drastic action himself. "Deep into the grading I see." Charlie could hear the smirk in his father's tone of voice. He swore he could.

"Some of us are farther into it than others," Amita replied.

"Hrumph." Without any grace Charlie uncapped the pen and refocused on question one. Let **v** be an (n x 1) vector….

"He's always like this just before grades are due," his father commented to Amita. Did he have to sound so patronizing about it? Surely he'd grown up from a whiny six year old being told to scrub the dishes?

"Any fatherly advice to make it better?" she asked.

"Do your best to ignore his tantrum."

He wasn't listening. Given an integer k, 1 less than or equal to k less than or equal to n, find a Householder matrix Q such that Q**v** equals **w.**

"I'll have to try it." Really he wasn't listening. He was certain Amita was smiling at him fondly.

"If you figure out how to do it successfully, let me know."

She laughed. "Sure thing."

"You don't have to talk about me as if I'm not here," Charlie growled.

"Do you have something you want to add, son?"

"No." He then made a deliberate show of brushing some imaginary fluff off of Jeremy Dunkin's exam before directing his attention to where it should be. It was clear the boy understood the question, but it was also clear that he was sloppy in demonstrating it.

Out of the corner of his eyes he saw his father squeeze Amita's shoulder in sympathy as he strolled into the kitchen.

Several minutes—and three undecipherable words—later Alan shouldered open the kitchen door with his hands full of picnic basket. He carried it into the entryway and set it on the coffee table next to the lime green fluted bowl which held Don's mail. It was still full of Friday's unopened letters. His father picked up the topmost letter (it was a noticeably thick one) and checked the date stamp in the corner, as if he expected the mark to tell him his eldest son's state of mind.

Putting the pen and exam on the table he asked, "Did you hear Don leave this morning?"

"Donnie?" His father dropped the letter back into the bowl as if it burned. "No, I haven't seen him since I left you two by the fire late last night. He was gone when I woke up, so he must have left sometime before sunrise."

"When I tried calling this morning I got shunted to his voice mail 'Please leave a message for Don Eppes,'" he mimicked the recording, "'I'll return your call as soon as possible.' He should change the last sentence to 'I'll never return your call.'"

"I got the same message."

"He's probably busy with a million different things," Charlie said trying to find a logical reason for Don's unusual silence.

"Probably." That was hollow reassurance.

"Think we should be worried?"

"A father always worries. He'll come back. He just needs some time to himself for a while."

"Because I'd," Charlie gave a well practiced shrug, "you know, be happy to drive over to the FBI and find him."

"You," Amita thumped his stack of ungraded Linear Algebra exams, "need to grade."

His father simply raised an eyebrow, crossed his arms, and changed the subject. "You'll remember to feed the fish sometime this afternoon while I'm out with Millie."

Millie. She was the one ultimately responsible for his morning of gloom. Feeding the koi was a task he'd rather avoid in favor of the horrors of poorly worded proofs. "I'm not going to forget about feeding the fish," he muttered, grabbing the pen again and fisting it until his knuckles turned white.

"I'm just reminding you."

"Fine, fine…" Charlie mumbled.

However, before he could immerse himself in the unwanted work of grading, the doorbell rang. Millie—the slave driver—let herself in and knocked on the wooden door jam to announce herself. "Hello? Anyone home?"

His father went to greet her and kiss her on the cheek. "Good morning."

"It's going to be a sunny, beautiful afternoon too," she said eyes alight. "Grading party?" she asked turning her attention to him and Amita.

"No, it's a war of attrition," Amita said deadpan.

"Very droll," Charlie said.

"Did you just call me droll?"

"Me?" he said arranging his expression into one of a perfect picture of innocence. "Can't I just flunk them all and be done with it?"

"No," both Millie and Amita said simultaneously.

"Fine," he huffed, "I'll give them all As. It will be a cause of general celebration throughout campus."

Ignoring him Millie approached the basket and peeked into the wicker depths. "Did you pack the strawberries?" she asked his father.

"Yes."

"And the champagne?"

His father leaned in close to whisper in Millie's ear. "Quiet an expensive brand."

His boss nearly giggled at that reply. "And the ch—"

"If either one of you mention chocolate in my presence I'll have the locks changed while you're away."

"And on that uplifting note, I think we'll let you two unlucky professors get to it. We'll return before dinner," Alan said and picked up their picnic lunch. Millie grinned like a cat with a freshly caught canary. He glowered at his first exam and resisted the urge to tear it to shreds.

Over her shoulder Millie called back, "If all the grades you submit are As, I'll personally sit and watch you regrade them," Millie said.

"What possessed me to go into teaching?" he wondered aloud.

"The lure of the ivory tower and the desire to quash your intellectual rivals," Millie said chuckling as she sauntered outside.

"I told you. It's a war," he told Amita.

"Um hum," Amita folded one of her tests over to the front page and scribbled an A next to her student's name. She tapped her pen on the table and reached for another exam.

"Charlie?" his father asked from the porch.

"Yeah?"

"Don'll call."

He let the tension in his shoulders relax. "Yeah."

"Don't forget the koi." And with those parting words the door snicked shut.

Charlie watched Amita frown at the paper in front of her. He itched to pull a wayward lock of her hair behind her ear. She'd come a long way in the few years he'd known her. When she approached him about the job of thesis advisor he never would have envisioned her transformation from wide-eyed graduate student to a professor in her own right. He also never would have foreseen what she would mean to him. And with their past actions—he'd never refer to that evening as a mistake—far behind them, the change suited her. "We have the house to ourselves now. Wanna take a break?" Giving in to temptation he leaned close and tucked her hair tidy.

"Nice try." Exasperated, she pushed him back gently and checked her watch again. "We get a break in fifty minutes. Grade."

"I'm willing to bet they left some strawberries and chocolate behind. Promise to make it worth my while?"

She eyed him with suspicion. "If you're good."

"Have I ever not been?"

"You have an ego the size of Texas."

"That's not what you sa—"

"Do you really think it would be wise to finish that sentence?"

"Probably not." He turned his attention once again to Mr. Dunkin's atrocious penmanship. Was that a greater than or less than sign? He let the symbols and numbers blur together as he spaced out once more. His brother's work and world were falling apart and here he was held hostage to the petty demands of a grading curve. The roar of the car's engine as it backed out of the driveway jerked him out of his trance. He couldn't do this. He sighed again, pushed the stack away, pushed his chair away from the table, and stood.

Amita focused all her attention on him. "You really don't want to do this do you?"

"No."

"Why not?"

The tension hovered, thrummed, over them, like a Blackhawk helicopter: loud and deadly. How could one possibly concentrate—let alone rest—while the future loomed in ever closer, ever greedy? "There's going to be another fight. I can just feel it."

"And you don't want to fight?"

"Oh, I want to," he said and started to pace. "Oh, how I want to."

"But it isn't your fight right now. It's Don's."

"I know and I don't know how to help."

"If he'd wanted your help he would have retuned your call." It was blunt, but it was the truth.

"That's a fair point," he allowed. "What gets me is that even if he did want it there isn't some radical new algorithm we could apply to solve the mess Colby left behind."

"We?"

That stopped him short. In Larry's absence he hadn't realized before this moment how much he expected her to always be there whenever he needed a sounding board. "If you're willing that is. Two is always better than one."

"That it is," she said smiling as the strand of her hair fell forward again. "Charlie, you know I'm willing to give any help you need, right?"

"Of course."

"Even if it's just listening?" He nodded and she continued. "Do you feel guilty for uncovering Ashby's Janus List?"

"No! Yes. I don't know," he shoved his own hair out of his eyes. "Do you?"

"Honestly? I haven't let myself think about it. I'm sure I will after I've managed to get this semester's grades in and allowed myself to process everything."

That explained why she'd been riding him about starting his grading. "He specifically asked for me. He wanted me." He thumped his chest for good measure. "There's no way Taylor Ashby didn't know how the members of Don's team coincided with his List."

"You may be brilliant, Charlie, but you aren't the only mathematician in the world."

"But I'm a damn good one."

"There's that ego resurfacing."

The doorbell interrupted his pacing.

"You expecting anyone?" Amita asked.

"No." Thorough the glass he could see two suited men with firm, grim expressions. One held a bulging black leather briefcase and the other had his hands in his pockets so his gun couldn't be missed. He groaned. This didn't look good.

"Who is it?"

"Trouble." He unbolted the front door.

"Professor Charles Eppes?" the man on the right asked. No, this was definitely _not_ good at all.

He plastered a smile on his face, which he hoped was at least remotely inviting. "Yes. And you are?"

"Agents Westwood and," he gestured to his partner, "Markenson with," they both flashed their government credentials, "the NSA. We understand you've done some high security work for us in the past and, additionally, are familiar with the Taylor Ashby's so called Janus List."

That wiped the forced smile off his face right quick. "I am familiar with the Janus List, yes." He felt rather than saw Amita come up behind him. It may have been shallow, but he wasn't going to go out of his way to make them welcome.

"May we come in?"

"Will that be necessary?"

Westwood didn't even miss a beat. "We can talk here if you'd like—it would be fitting as Janus was also the god of gates and doorways—but as this is a matter of national security, I'd prefer to conduct our conversation indoors and out of the heat of the sun since the weather service is predicting near record temperatures. May we come in?"

Charlie said nothing as he swung the door wide and stepped aside to allow the men into his home. This was the beginning of more than trouble and he was sure it wouldn't end well. They proceeded to make themselves at home in his living room. Markenson put the briefcase down on the floor next to the couch.

"This is Professor Amita Ramanujan. We," he gestured to Amita, "were just finishing up some end of the term grading."

"In college I always figured my Profs just threw darts to assign grades." Westwood said and looked Amita up and down.

"Now there's a thought," Charlie said under his breath.

"It's a thankless task," she shrugged and shook their hands. Even Markenson eyed her like she was a bug to be squashed under a shoe.

"Professor Ramanujan, do you—"

"Dr. Ramanujan," she cut in.

"Dr. Ramanujan," Agent Westwood amended moving his gaze from her breasts to her face, "do you have the same level of security clearance as Dr. Eppes?"

"I'm sorry, I don't."

"Amita's assistance was invaluable while I worked on decoding Ashby's work," Charlie cut in trying to ease the discomfort in the room. "She's deep in the application and background process for security clearance."

Markenson wasn't impressed. "But it isn't completed, is it?"

"No," Amita said to the floor.

"If your questions are at all related to Ashby's Janus List then you should know Amita has full clearance for that. The FBI granted it," Charlie added resisting the urge to step in front of Amita to protect her.

"We understand." Westwood replied, "However, we're also quite positive that the NSA has _not_ granted it. Furthermore, this situation is going to require the utmost discretion. Ma'am would you excuse us for a moment? It's for your own protection."

"No problem. I'll be in the yard," Amita murmured to Charlie as she passed.

Westwood made no attempt to conceal his interest in Amita's legs and backside as she went out into the backyard. The man let out a low wolfish whistle. "I wish I'd had university professors like that…"

"What is it I can help you gentlemen with?" Charlie crossed his arms across his chest and made sure to plant his feet firmly in order to give himself the illusion of control.

"We need your assistance," Westwood began, although it was apparent it galled him to have to ask in the first place. "As you know the FBI forwarded the names on Ashby's Janus list to various departments and agencies: the NSA, Homeland Security, the Pentagon."

"I was aware, yes."

"We believe the list is a fake."

"You mean it isn't a list of international spies?" Charlie asked skeptically.

"Spies yes. However, it isn't a list that could do a lot of damage."

Charlie wasn't sure he believed that, but if the man was lying through his teeth then he looked pretty confident about it. "But it could still cause damage?" Charlie asked thinking of the little Don had told him about Colby's confession.

"Some yes," admitted Westwood, "but that's not what interests us. We," he stressed the word to imply more than he and his deputy, "believe Ashby intended to pass this list as a decoy."

Charlie snorted. "He went to an awful lot of trouble to hide this list for it to be a decoy."

"That is not what concerns us." He motioned to Markenson and the briefcase.

"Yes, sir," Markenson opened the briefcase, pulled out a manila envelope, which he gave to his superior, and a sheet of paper, which he offered to Charlie. He took it reluctantly; it felt heavy, far heavier than the exams on the other side of the room. "It's the list of—"

"I recognize the names and country affiliations."

"I'm sure you do," Westwood replied sliding out a packet of papers from the envelope. He handed this to Charlie. "_This_ is a list of names of people who we know for a fact are spying against the United States. Most, but not all, of them aren't included in the Janus List and as you can see it is extensive."

It was. As Charlie leafed through the packet he could see that each page featured a name, a biographical sketch, several paragraphs about the deeds and deaths the individual was suspected of committing, and the actions taken to neutralize the peril they posed. There were no pictures and he was relieved things were kept in black and white text so he was unable to match a face with a name. "What do you need me for?"

"We wish to put together a threat assessment of the damage that could be done to our spy program if the true Janus List were to be released to the international community. In conjunction with the threat assessment, we will also require a list of the most advantageous replacements."

"But this packet wouldn't help to determine such a list."

"Correct."

Puzzled Charlie asked, "They why did you—"

"So you can see what you're fighting against," Markenson replied as if he were trying to convince himself of the validity of his words.

"We'd like to impress upon you the utmost necessity for security. No family members or collegiate colleagues may know the true nature of this case. We'll let you browse that packet for an hour. When we return you can either decline the offer, or we'll escort you to our offices where we'll be happy to brief you in more detail. Do you understand the terms as I have presented them to you?"

Did he understand the terms? Could the man use more convoluted language? "I understand," Charlie said flatly, feeling the weight and power of what he held in his hands.

"No one, Professor Eppes." And with that Westwood retreated to the front door while Markenson reclaimed the briefcase.

"One hour." 

"One hour," he echoed as they left. Alone, he dumped the packet of information on the table next to his ungraded exams. Only then did he bend his head and allow his shoulders to slump.

He'd always known he had a moral obligation to assist, no matter how rude the two NSA agents may have acted. He'd worked for jerks in the past and would undoubtedly work for many more in the future. He took in a deep breath. It was time to make his apologies to Amita.

He found her standing by the koi pond's edge and bathed in bright sunlight feeding greedy, openmouthed fish small crumbs of food. A light breeze brushed her hair slightly and even though the grass muffled his approach, he saw her tense.

"Are you alright?"

She tossed a final handful into the water, brushed her hands together, and wiped them on her jeans. "They gone?"

"They'll be back in 'bout an hour." She still wouldn't look at him directly and instead watched the fish gulp at the surface. They seemed to be struggling to reach something they could never reach, never understand, but it didn't stop them from trying. "Agent Westwood was out of line."

"I'm fine, Charlie," she replied still watching the koi finish their meal. "It isn't your job to protect me."

Silently he disagreed because it was, but he was smart enough not to voice his opinion. Instead he decided to wait her out. A bird's shadow—a hawk's significant shape—passed over the rippling water. The bird was circling, hunting for easy prey. Another warm breeze ruffled the treetops…and her hair. He was always entranced with her hair. Eventually, the fish gave up gasping the air.

When she looked at him there weren't tears in her eyes, but their easily could have been.

"The man's an ass," he said.

"No kidding. That won't be the last time someone doesn't take me seriously because I'm a woman," she shrugged. "It certainly wasn't the first."

He couldn't offer her false comfort or false platitudes, so he offered her the comfort of his presence instead. He reached for the tin of fish food—it smelled worse every time—and dumped a handful onto his palm. As if there was a siren, the koi returned. He tossed the food in and they watched the fish gobble and gorge. When the surface was calm Amita slipped her hand into his and in unspoken agreement they walked back to the house.

When they made it inside, Charlie had to blink several times before his eyes adjusted to the dim light of the house.

"Guess you won't be leaving anything lying around this time," she said eying the top secret branded packet of paper.

"Guess not."

Amita didn't say anything further and instead started to collect her things.

"Look I'm sorry. It's a huge task and I plan on asking them if you'd be able to assist me."

"Stop," she bristled and put her fingers to his lips. "They don't want me. They asked for you. They want you." It hurt more than it should to hear his own words parroted back to him. "You're the master; I'm the apprentice." Was that bitterness or acceptance? "Charlie, I understand. Really I do," she added when she saw the expression on his face. "You already have the necessary clearance. I don't."

"I'd have you help me if I could."

"I know. I probably shouldn't have peeked over your shoulder last week and nosed into your brother's case. It was your work. Charlie, I…" she groped for words and piled all her exams and test keys into a messy stack and thrust the collection into her backpack, "I have work of my own to do."

"I'm still sorry."

"Let it go."

He leaned over to kiss her on the cheek, but seeing her tense he stopped. He didn't need to be punched. She made haste towards the door, not even glancing at him. She didn't exactly slam it, but he winced all the same.

Charlie sat down heavily like Atlas with the world on his shoulders. He didn't need to add another god to the mix, Janus was enough he thought wryly. It looked like he wasn't going to start his grading after all. It was funny how a previously mundane task now suddenly looked like heaven. With one wistful look at the closed door and another out the window to the backyard, he buckled down and got to work reading about the man on the first page, Mr. Ta-Ming Wang.

When Westwood and Markenson pulled their unmarked vehicle into the driveway forty-five minutes later, Charlie was already waiting on the front porch. The hawk still circled and the cloying fishy scent still lingered on his hands.

It would be a long time before it came off.

-oOo-

The New Heights apartment complex was inappropriately named; New Lows would've been more apt. Scattered fast-food debris decorated the parking lot, a security camera (they were going to have to examine that footage) followed their approach into the main building, there was no pool, and when they entered the empty reception area the phone behind the desk was ringing incessantly.

Maintenance had also neglected to purchase new hall lights and one of them cast a sickly-green light down the hallway outside number 113. Don wasn't having any luck with lighting today. Furthermore, the high pitched whine of the air conditioner next door sent Don's headache into overdrive.

"You get any sleep last night?" David asked as he jiggled the key into the lock. It stuck.

"No." Don rubbed his temples again. "You?"

"Enough," David said and pushed the door open with his shoulder.

A man's home was his soul and, door now wide open for inspection, they walked into the private world of Agent Granger. David flicked on the light.

It was a sparse one bedroom apartment with a living room just big enough for a three seat sofa and an even smaller kitchen. No plants to water. No fish to feed. It reminded Don of his own apartment. This was a resting place, but it wasn't home; home life would always take second place to work life. Col—Agent Granger got a double dose of that in the Army Special Forces and again with his job with the FBI. Don was lucky enough to escape to his childhood home; Granger had escaped to the Chinese.

Time to paw though the man's sorry life.

The apartment may have been a dump, but it was neat. Too neat. "He has a maid service come in to clean, doesn't he?"

"Yeah, but they come Wednesdays."

Don looked at him askance.

"He always complains about them moving his stuff around," David elaborated.

"Right. I'll take the bath and bedroom. You take the living room and kitchen."

"Sure," David nodded.

In the bathroom's mirrored medicine cabinet he found a bottle of prescription sleeping pills and, ironically, a bottle of Aleve, but no secret Chinese battle plans. Frowning Don opened the bottle of Aleve, snagged two, and drowned them with a paper cup full of water. He didn't linger on his reflection once he'd closed the cabinet.

The bed was made with military precision. Did he know when he left in the morning he wouldn't be sleeping in it the following night? The gentlemen's magazines tucked away in the nightstand table were the only thing remotely suggesting deviancy in the whole room. And Don could hardly fault him for it. There wasn't any dirty laundry stuffed into the closet, instead there were rows of suits and a rack of ties. The man even hung his jeans neatly.

A shoebox, partially hidden behind a Cardinal's baseball hat, had been shoved to the back of the top shelf. He pulled it down and took off the cover.

Inside were newspaper clippings, a silver Lieutenant status bar, old army pictures in which Dwayne was prominently featured, as well as various combat medals and commendations. The green, red, black, and white striped Afghanistan Campaign Medal gave him pause for a moment, but Don shoved his unease away as quickly as it surfaced.

On the very bottom there was a whitish-grey feather.

Don took it out and rippled the fibers down and then smoothed them together. Why would Granger keep a ratty, old feather inside a shoebox full of Army memorabilia? He closed the shoebox and started to put it back in the closet, but something stopped him. Thinking better of it he put it under his arm and went to find David.

Walking through the kitchen he glared at the dentist's reminder postcard stuck to the refrigerator with a pizza advertisement magnet. There was also a note reminding of an appointment with a Dr. B. at 6pm on Tuesday. He flicked the note and frowned. The headache drugs could kick in anytime. There was a pile of dirty dishes in the sink which made Don feel a tab bit better.

Normal. Normal. Normal.

The message light on the phone flashed. Don hit the button, but all that played was static. Flipping through the caller ID screen Don noted there hadn't been a call received since Thursday two days before and the name listed was "Security Screen." Not very helpful.

David had been rummaging through the desk. "Find anything?" Don asked glancing at a set of well used golf clubs that begged to be taken from the corner.

"An old checkbook, which I might add is balanced to the penny," David held up a bank booklet. "And crumpled restaurants receipts." David held those up too.

"Not much in other words."

"Nope."

It was probably too much to hope for unexplainable bank statements from a Cayman Island bank.

"What'd you find?" David asked seeing the shoebox.

"Just a shoebox filled of old memories," he said, lifted the lid, and set it on the desk next to the laptop David had just pried open.

"Should we take the laptop in, or do you want to try and crack the password?" Don asked David.

"Let's try," David said and reached over to boot it up.

Don sat down in the chair while David tried to pace a hole in the shabby carpet. When the logon screen appeared Don asked, "Do you know the password?"

David thought for a moment "FalconFeather2002. Capital Fs. All one word."

It worked; Windows chimed annoying welcome music and the cursor changed to an hourglass. Don made a mental note to change his own password.

"Know the story behind it?"

"He once told me it was his flight to freedom."

"Freedom from what?"

"Don't know."

The computer didn't reveal any of Colby's secrets either and after a half an hour of fruitless searching Don powered it down. They could take it into the office for further investigation, but he had the hunch that nothing would pan out. While he was guilty of spying for a hostile country, Granger wasn't stupid. Something was missing here.

David echoed Don's thoughts aloud. "I'm beginning to think we're missing something."

Don eyed David. "Like?"

"Location for one. I've been in here a hundred times. I've watched football games here on Sundays. If Colby were a spy for the Chinese he would have been smart enough not to hide things where I would have seen them. Motive for another."

"Motive? You're questioning if he isn't a spy? You were about ready to take Granger's head off Friday night."

"So were you."

"Why are you suddenly trying to justify treason?"

"I'm not. However, you have a lot of time to think while you are staring at the ceiling fan trying to sleep."

David had been closest to Granger. It made sense that he'd eventually try to maintain the bonds of friendship. "You just don't want your friend to truly be a traitor and a spy?"

"No. But you need him to be, don't you?" David shot back.

Don winced.

"Sorry. That was uncalled for. I know the situation is atrocious, and yes, I find it surreal that we're searching Colby's apartment, but all I'm saying is that the situation doesn't add up. For someone who lived the life he did," David reached into the shoebox, pushed the feather aside, and pulled out the Afghanistan medal, "it's hard to imagine he'd fold like a puppet." David dropped the medal back in the shoebox. "Which is what he did last night."

"You're being awfully generous to someone who admitted he voluntarily worked for the Chinese. So now you've had this epiphany and think there's nothing wrong with Granger's actions?

"I'm not trying to be generous. I'm trying to understand the situation. There's a lot wrong with his actions, but I also think there's been a lot wrong with our actions," David said reluctantly.

"You're taking the blame from him and putting it on us?"

"Think Don, he told us exactly what we wanted to hear. After he admitted what he admitted, would any of us have listened to why he did what he did? I certainly wasn't in any frame of mind to do so."

"He knew we'd caught him red handed about to murder the reporter so he could save his own hide. He didn't have a choice," Don countered.

"He never gave an answer to why he did what he did. We didn't ask. What if he _was_ moving her out of the fire zone? Would any of us have listened?"

"What're you saying?"

"I'm saying if he knew his name was on Ashby's List then he knew that Charlie would eventually uncover it. I'm saying he knew Naomi Vaughn didn't know anything, so there wasn't a point for him to kill her. I'm saying it was in his best interest to cut and run long before he was a suspect, but that he stayed. I'm saying we don't know anything more about his motives than when we questioned him. And when we questioned him, he told us exactly what it would take for us to put him in custody."

"You want to talk to him again, don't you?"

"Yes."

"No. No way!"

"He may have been stressed, but he was in complete control of the situation last night. We did what he wanted. And _none_ of us asked him why!"

"We're not going to do this now," Don snapped.

David looked away and said nothing.

"I think we've been here long enough. He knew we'd search the place," Don said on the way out the door. "There isn't anything here."

David grunted in agreement as he locked the door behind them. Neither of them spoke on the way back to the office.

-oOo-


	3. A Garden in the Ocean

** Chapter III: A Garden in the Ocean **

The main spire of the Brotherhood of Altadena monastery cast a long shadow over the gravel parking lot as Megan pulled in. Looking out over the monastery grounds through the windshield she unbuckled and let the ignition die. She'd circled the block twice before deciding she was being ridiculous and now that she'd put the car in park doubt was creeping in again.

It was all postcard perfect: a well manicured hedge with bright pink flowers lined a stone walkway up to the gate, several smaller buildings and cottages sprawled lazily across the campus guarding the main church in the center, and the west side boasted a beautiful lawn with stately oak trees that reached strongly into the heavens and then let their branches sigh towards the grass.

She didn't think she could bring herself to go in.

Everything looked too peaceful; the idea of going inside gave her he willies. There were a million reasons she didn't want to be here. Her mother was the one who worshiped on a regular basis, attended confession like clockwork, and harassed her into attending services on Easter and Christmas when she was in high school.

She fought the urge to bolt. Gripping the steering wheel she closed her eyes and leaned her head against the leather head rest. Her breath was ragged, shallow. She didn't have to go in. Larry would never even know she was here.

Besides, the beautiful calligraphy note she'd found slipped under her door pretty much asked for her to grant him some privacy. She should return to her apartment and get some sleep. That would be the most practical thing to do. It would. Or if sleep proved slippery and elusive she could at least unpack her suitcase and start the laundry. Better yet she could catch up on daytime soap operas. Surely there was some fictional character whose life was in shambles she could sympathize with. When was the last time she'd even taken a day for herself? She couldn't even remember. That was probably the reason she needed one.

It was simple. All she needed to do was put her keys back in the ignition, turn the car on, and drive away. It would be an easy escape. And yet she clutched the wheel, paralyzed.

A knock on the driver's side window made her jump and hit the horn.

Through the glass Larry waved at her. After a stunned moment she silenced the deafening horn and rolled down the window. She tried, unsuccessfully, not to gape.

"Megan, are you alright?" he asked.

"You… I… What are you doing here?"

"I'm on a month's retreat. The question better question is why are you here?"

"I came to—I can't believe you're staying at a monastery!"

"Monasteries really do have a woefully dreadful reputation. They are places of retreat, relaxation, and reflection."

"I could use a bit of that myself," she muttered.

"That's what I was given to understand." What? How? "Don called to speak with me a few hours ago," Larry replied to her unasked question. "He said to expect you."

Damn Don and his Big Brother Syndrome! He had the ability to take care of everybody but himself. She swallowed, but knew she needed to ask the question. "Did he give you any of the details?"

"Some of them, but not all."

"So you know about Colby then?"

He nodded gravely. "I never would have foreseen his actions."

"Yeah. Me either," she said as she climbed out of the car and tried not to slam the door. She succeeded probably halfway.

"Wanna talk about it?"

"Not particularly," she said. Larry looked good. Really good. "But I would like a hug."

He held out his arms. "That I freely offer." She slipped into his embrace without hesitation; he felt like home just like her team had felt like family. Past tense. Before she knew it she could feel tears welling up and threatening to spill over on Larry's floral patterned shirt.

"You sure you're alright?"

Was she becoming a human watering can? Larry's print shirt didn't need moisture to grow! She sniffed back tears for the second time that day. That was two times too many in her opinion. "When did you want to talk about feelings?" If she kept this up she'd cry an entire ocean.

"I'll take that as a no, then."

She nodded into his shoulder and he patted her back. Once she'd gathered herself she pulled back and kissed his cheek. "I can't believe you're in a monastery!" she scolded deflecting any further inquiries about her weeping tendencies.

"After six months of celibacy, what's another four weeks?"

That made her laugh. "True."

Slipping her hand in his she allowed him to guide her out of the parking lot and up the cobble stone path up to the gate. He unlocked and opened it wide. He led her inside and directed her to the pink flowered hedge she'd noticed earlier. "I want you to smell these."

"The flowers?"

"Yes, the Rock Roses," he confirmed pointing to the flowers. It may have been a deliberate distraction, but that didn't mean that she wasn't thankful. When did he become the emotionally solid one in their relationship?

They were wrinkly little flowers, delicate with paper thin petals. She leaned forward to get her nose closer. "There's a weak scent there," she said and then inhaled again. "A bit like—" Humm… "like honey, maybe?"

"Just weak?" he asked.

"Yeah, why?"

"I'm trying to unravel some of Kingdom Plantae's secrets," he breathed deeply and sighed. "Their scent is overpowering to me: deep, rich, honey, musk. If there's an earthly ambrosia then those flowers are as close to the nectar of the Gods as I'll ever get. I've been asking all the monks if they can smell them. There's only one other who can smell them like I can."

"Who?"

"Brother Jikai."

"Jikai doesn't sound like a very Christian name."

"That's because it's not." Larry bent over the flowers once more and inhaled greedily. "The brothers have established relations with a Buddhist monastery outside of Kyoto, Japan. He's here on a year long exchange. He tends a beautiful Zen garden here on the grounds."

"I bet you've spent many hours there."

"I will admit to having pondered many of life's mysteries there in the past three weeks," he revealed. "Would you like to see it?"

"That'd be wonderful."

"Come on, then," he said and led her through a maze of paths through the monastery grounds. They passed several monks going about their late morning chores. The sun was radiant, and Megan shaded her eyes with her hand wishing she'd had the foresight to grab her sunglasses when she got out of the car.

Ten minutes and ten thousand rose buds later they rounded the last trail corner and the garden spilled into view. "There are times I feel as if I'm emerging from Plato's cave whenever I come out here," Larry said, "That sounds philosophical, but it's no less true."

The rock and sand garden was housed in a small space, but nonetheless it was spectacular. A small fountain gurgled in the shade of several more oaks. There was a rake leaning against the far white-washed wall which had obviously been used to smooth out the glittering sand around a dozen irregularly shaped, large rocks. The raked ridges in the sand circled each stone and flared out like waves. The stones were the only points of reference in the vast ocean of sand. The large expanse made her feel dizzy; it was as if she would be swallowed whole if she walked through it all and disturbed the pattern. She was too small to even contemplate doing such a thing.

"Stunning, isn't it?" Larry asked jerking her out of her reverie.

"Uhh. Yeah."

"They sweep the sand into a new pattern every morning just after sunrise."

"It's beautiful," she said trying to sound more coherent. "Beautiful and staggering at the same time."

"Thank you. This is nothing to the Ryōan-ji garden, but the sentiment is appreciated." A monk, dressed in a bright orange robe came up beside them. He moved with the presence of a young man even though Megan was positive he was several years older than she.

"Megan, may I introduce Brother Jikai."

"Pleased to meet you," he spoke formally with the wisp of an Eastern accent. It made Megan smile.

"And I you. Can I ask what your name means?" she asked.

"Certainly. Jikai directly translated means 'ocean of compassion.' It is fitting then that I am the one to create and tend this garden. Larry, would you like to postpone our meditation session for later in the afternoon since you have a visitor?"

She shouldn't have come. "I didn't mean to interrupt your plans," Megan interjected. She really shouldn't have come! "I don't have to stay long."

"Your friend would also be welcome to join us," Jikai added.

"Megan?" Larry asked

"I don't have anything planned," she hedged. "But if I'd be in the way then—"

Larry cut her off. "Good, then it's settled. You'll come."

What in the hell had Don told Larry?

So, fifteen minutes later Megan found herself standing inside one of the lesser chapels gazing up at the stained glass windows. They glowed in a rainbow of color and each pane depicted a different scene from the Old Testament. The largest scene was that of Adam and Eve, dressed discreetly in fig leaves, in the thriving, flourishing Garden of Eden. The snake coiled on a lush apple branch. That would be temptation and Genesis then.

What type of apple could have possibly tempted Colby?

What type of apple would have tempted her? Despite the warmth of the room she shivered.

Her heels clicked on the lacquered floor when she deliberately moved on to look at the reed filled panel from Exodus on the left. Her mother had tried, unsuccessfully, to drill the books of the Bible in her head: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus. She couldn't remember what came next. Deuteronomy perhaps? No, that wasn't right.

Larry, carrying his shoes in his hands, came up beside her. "You'll want to be comfortable. Go ahead and take off your shoes."

Brother Jikai, who had unearthed three small, black pillows from a cabinet at the rear of the chapel, agreed. After toeing off her shoes she unbuttoned and took off her suit jacket, leaving her in a light blue sleeveless shell and slacks. Her gun holster was digging into her hip so she removed that as well.

She caught Jikai eyeing it.

"Sorry," she blushed. Here she was with a gun in a church chapel. It was clear he didn't approve of the weapon. "It's an occupational hazard."

"No need to apologize," he said and handed a pillow to her and another to Larry. "Go ahead and seat yourselves while I dim the lights."

Larry strolled to the front near the altar and sat. Megan followed and set her jacket, shoes, and Glock an arm span away. Once the main lights dimmed and Jikai rejoined them she noticed how brightly the candles upon the altar shone.

It wasn't holy per se, but the mood in the room shifted to something more intimate. What mattered was what was inside, not the rest of the world.

Properly seated—legs in a modified half lotus position with her knees as close to the floor as her muscles would stretch—on the pillow she felt like a fish out of water. "What do I do now?" she asked Jikai.

"Zen meditation, or zazen meditation, practices are two thousand and six hundred years old," the monk began. "They have been passed down year after year from master to novice for generation to generation. It's the most vital practice that can be taught. In meditation body, breath, and mind come together as one," Megan had to hide a smile when she realized he lectured like Charlie—all heart and enthusiasm—explaining a theorem near and dear to his heart. "Breathe through your nose and count each half breath you take," he said and in demonstration inhaled. "One." Then he exhaled. "Two. When you reach ten, return to one and begin again."

Meditation was as simple as that? It sounded ridiculously easy.

"Breathe deeply, as deeply as you can, and listen to your inner self. Simply be," he advised her and fell silent. She could already hear Larry's deep breathing next to her.

Okay. She could do this. Inhale. One. Exhale. Two. Three. Four. This is stupid. Megan sighed and realized she'd already lost count. One. Really stupid. Two. Three. Inhale. Exhale. The chapel smelled strongly of sandalwood incense. Inhale. It was a wonderful scent and she took a bigger breath to savor it.

Was she on six? Or was it seven? No, it was six, wasn't it? Argh! Go back to the beginning, Megan.

One.

Two.

Three.

-oOo-

Ever since the reorganization of the Bureau after the September 11th attacks, the Counterterrorism and Counterintelligence Office had, in Don's personal opinion, been stretching and skirting the bounds of legality. True patriots seemed to be in scarce supply. The grapevine said the Director and Deputy Director looked the other way while Executive Assistant Director Michael Dolon got the job done. He may be a relatively short man in possession of an ever-expanding balding forehead, but the handful of times Don had met him he presented the image he could steer the course of the world—and probably often did—in the direction he plotted and desired.

Pity the fool who got in the way.

Dolon had taken possession of one of the spare Los Angeles offices that afternoon for debriefing sessions about the recent events. Don sat just outside the door in the small lobby cooling his heels waiting for an audience.

Don flipped open his phone and scanned through the Caller IDs he'd missed while he'd had his phone turned off: home, home, home, home, Charlie's cell, Naomi Vaughn, Charlie's cell, Charlie's cell. He nearly hit the send button to call Charlie back, but pride stopped him. He didn't need his baby brother to coach him through the day; plus he needed to keep Charlie safe and away from Granger's mess. Later, after the day was over, he wouldn't have a problem venting to Charlie, but not now. He was strong enough to handle this on his own.

He had to be.

The door to Dolon's office opened and the man himself stuck his head out. "Agent Eppes?"

"Yes," Don said looking up.

Dolon replied curtly, "Come in and be sure to shut the door behind you."

Getting to his feet Don hid the phone away; his family was to be off limits. As soon as the door was shut it was clear that Dolon was completely in control. And he was completely pissed. "I understand you were out at the New Heights apartment complex?"

"Yes."

"I came directly from the airport to have you brief me on the situation as soon as possible only to discover you were gone."

Don squared his jaw and tried to regain the ground he'd lost. "I apologize."

"I'm not looking for an apology. I'm looking for answers. Why were you there and not here?"

As if the man didn't already know why. "Agent Granger's apartment is at New Heights."

Dolon moved to sit behind the desk, which dominated the room, and when he was settled steepled his fingers. "_That_ was a very stupid thing to do. I'm disappointed in you, Eppes."

That felt like a punch to the gut. He'd already apologized once and had it thrown back in his face, so he was too proud to attempt it again. Instead he waited out the Director's scrutiny; he felt like one of his old Academy teachers was about to throw the book at him. For something one of his classmates had done.

"Well?" Dolon finally broke their battle of wills. "Did you find anything?"

"Nothing to further aid in the espionage case against him. However, we did get several months worth of the apartment security tapes. I hope we'll uncover something in them."

"You will not."

Don blinked, but managed to hold his temper in check by counting to ten. Slowly. In French. "Pardon me?"

"You will cease your investigation into Colby Granger's personal life. You will personally give the security tapes to me, and in the future you will clear any further investigation through me. Is that clear?"

What the hell? "As mud," he muttered under his breath.

"What was that?"

"Yes, _sir_."

"Good." Dolon got up from behind the massive, wooden desk and turned to look out over the Los Angeles skyline. "David Sinclair went with you?" Dolon charged on.

"It wasn't his idea," Don covered.

Dolon turned from the city's vista to look at him. His eyes narrowed, "Where was Megan Reeves?"

"She has today off."

"This was your suggestion?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

Was every single decision he'd made in the past two days going to be questioned? He was too used to being in charge and the role reversal was insulting. "She was rattled this morning. Her interview could easily be pushed to tomorrow," Don tried to explain.

Dolon tapped his fingers against his thigh while he pondered Don's answer. "Are you directing the actions of those under your command?"

He looked Dolon boldly in the eyes. "I'm sorry, but are you questioning my loyalties?"

"After your sloppy actions in the past few hours, how can I not?"

Don drew in a deep breath and tried to calm down, but his heart was racing and he could feel himself start to sweat. "I failed to recognize that one of my subordinates was a double agent and that's my fault. I'll take responsibility for it, but to question my loyalty is insulting."

"May I remind you, Eppes, that you're not on very solid ground with me at the moment."

"I am as dedicated to the FBI as I was when I took the oath."

"Then let us move on to the second subject."

"Sir?" Don looked up sharply.

"Taylor Ashby and his alleged Janus List will be kept an internal FBI matter. Agent Granger will be released tomorrow and all charges will be dropped. Ashby was a sad, old man looking to cause trouble. The list he provided is a fake and Granger _will_ be cleared. When he requests transfer papers in the next day or two, you will grant them."

Released? Fake? Transfer? "The man's a Chinese spy!"

"You will grant the transfer," Dolon said firmly ignoring Don's outburst, "with no questions asked. Agent Granger is no longer your concern."

"He is very much my concern!"

"No, he is not."

Had Don dropped into some alternate reality? What was this? Granger was a spy and he was going to walk away completely scot-free, while Don was going to have his loyalty questioned and tarnished.

"I strongly protes—"

"Unless you wish to receive a poor performance review, I suggest you drop the attitude and this line of inquiry. The subject is closed, Agent. Is there anyone else that has heard or seen the list of names besides the agents under you?"

"My brother Charlie and Amita Ramanujan."

"I understand that Ashby went out of his way to speak to your brother, but this is the first mention I've heard of Ms. Ramanujan."

"They were assisting us with the mathematical aspects of the case and they were the ones to crack the password into Naomi Vaughn's voice mail," Don replied.

"You will see they speak to no one and show no further interest in the Janus List?"

"Will that be—"

"I want your word, Eppes," Dolon butted in again.

"I can't speak for my brother or for—"

"Your word." The man was as cold as ice. "I want Professor Eppes, Ms. Ramanujan, and especially Ms. Vaughn kept as far away from the Janus List as possible.

"Then you have my _word_." Don knew disrespect was dripping from his words, but couldn't control himself enough to dampen it. "Is that all, sir?"

"You may go. We will speak again shortly. Please send in Agent Sinclair."

It took all his years of training and willpower not to slam the door on his way out.

-oOo-

"Operation Falcon's Blessing is a secret, perpetual, officially sanctioned operation to place our spies in strategic locations throughout the world," Victor Westwood began. "It, to quote Sun Tzu, is of vital importance to the State. As you can imagine, Taylor Ashby's compilation of the Janus List, incomplete though it may be, has the unfortunate consequence of undermining several decades worth of work."

Justin Markenson clicked a button and the projection screen shifted from the National Security Agency's eagle and key logo to a Falcon crest. The bird's wings were outstretched and caught in mid flight, his beak turned regally to the right side, and one talon clutched a sharply pointed dagger while the other held an untarnished, golden shield. It was a terrible parody of the Seal of the President.

"The operatives," Westwood continued, "come from many different walks of life: old and young; citizens and foreigners; military personnel and civilians; teachers, engineers, garbage collectors, and ministers. Each agent has a dedication to assuring the United States is protected from its foes. Each came to the program with open eyes and was fully briefed of the consequences. Membership is a lifelong commitment."

"This is an NSA sponsored program?" Charlie asked.

"Of course," said Westwood, "Neither the FBI or CIA have the legal authority to collect foreign data as we do."

"Why me?"

"As we said earlier this morning, you are already inadvertently involved in the case. While, our cryptologists and analysts scrutinize and evaluate the information our spies provide, they are not allowed to know how the information is collected, or who collects it."

Charlie tapped his fingers on the tabletop. His fingerprints left smudge marks on the clean glass. "Who supervises the collection of it?"

"I do."

"Personally?"

"Naturally," Westwood said and flicked a piece of fluff off his suit jacket. A secretary—dressed in a short skirt—entered the room and placed a tray with a pitcher of water and three glasses on the table in front of Charlie.

"Thank you Ms. Bedell," said Westwood.

"You're welcome, sir. Is there anything else?"

"No, that will be fine for now."

"I will bring lunch in an hour." She spun on her three inch high heels and sauntered out.

"Would you like a glass?" Markenson asked Charlie.

Since his mouth was dry and was probably going to get drier the longer he sat and listen he said, "Yes."

Markenson poured out the water, pushed a glass to Charlie, and kept one for his own. Charlie took a gulp; the water was cold and it gave him something to grasp. "I assume you are worried about the list of names being compiled."

"Yes. If, that is, it is widely released."

"I trust you are working on protecting the information?"

"Of course," replied Westwood waving the question and concern away as if it were an annoying gnat, "there are others working on it. However, that is not our primary concern at present."

"Where are we going to start?" Charlie asked.

"You are here to complete an analysis of a worse case scenario. Going forward, if the true Janus List becomes public we will need to protect our spies, cut our losses, and rebuild our network. The time and money necessary for rebuilding will be immense. We wish to identify which of our current spies are the most valuable and then go through the profiles of several likely new candidate recruits.

"Before we continue on to the next slide, I must again stress the importance of not revealing any of what you are working on. To anyone."

"I understand," Charlie nodded.

"Do you?" Westwood's voice was sharp. "No buxom assistants, interfering FBI agents, or family members."

Charlie tried not to grind his teeth. "Yes, I understand," he hissed and took a sip of water to cover his irritation.

"Very well. Markenson, will you retrieve the necessary paper work for Mr. Eppes to review and sign?"

"Yes, sir. It is just outside," Markenson said and scurried out.

While they waited Charlie pulled out his phone to check his messages. He frowned; still no word from Don.

"Expecting a call?" Westwood inquired.

"Half hoping for one," Charlie said sadly pocketing the phone, "but I'm not expecting it. Not anymore." Don had made his choice and Charlie had made his.

Markenson returned and immediately put three documents and a pen on the table in front of Charlie. "The first is a supplementary confidentiality agreement to augment your standing one, the second is the contract for the work, and the final one dictates your compensation." Charlie'd been expecting the contract and confidentiality agreement. He'd had to sign several such documents in the past. They seemed to be pretty standard and everything seemed to be in order.

Well, if Don wouldn't return his calls and clearly didn't want his help, the project Westwood was offering would give him something tangible to do. He would help in his own way. He signed the first two without hesitation, but his eyes bugged when he saw the proposed payment figure.

Westwood must have seen his reaction. "You can see we mean business."

"No kidding," Charlie replied and added the date and signature at the bottom. He offered the pen and papers to Westwood for him to sign to complete the agreement. Westwood's signature was just as much of a scrawled mess as his own.

When Westwood straightened he swept up the contracts and handed them to Markenson. "Markenson will make copies so you can have a set for your records," he said.

"Yes, sir." The man took the papers and obeyed the command like a pup on a lead.

Silence descended for a second time and Charlie resorted to small talk. "Did you have a quick flight from back east?"

"Three of us flew in yesterday afternoon. The thunderstorms over the plains added an extra hour to the trip because of the detour," the man scowled. It seemed like he wanted the weather punished for his inconvenience.

"I've always found it amazing how even a chaotic system like the weather can have such beauty and such order. Weathermen may be eluded by the details, but the general pattern is plainly visible."

"A butterfly flaps its wings, Professor?"

"That's an overly clichéd way to put it, but yes."

"It is also true for spying. Events hundreds of miles away—across the world—have the ability to, and do, impact us."

Markenson came back in the room and handed the originals to Westwood and the copies to Charlie.

"Are we ready to begin?" Westwood asked.

"Yes," both Markenson and Charlie replied.

"Then we shall start with the Agent with whom you are personally familiar: Colby Granger." The screen changed and Colby's face and vital statistics now graced the big screen.

Charlie nearly choked on his water. "I was under the impression he was under arrest for treason."

"Yes," Westwood said as if that was a completely boneheaded statement.

"For being co-opted by the Chinese!"

"We, and Granger himself, have gone to great lengths to see that he would be so seen."

"I don't understand."

"You will," Markenson plopped a heavy stack of papers in front of him. How Charlie wished they were his unmarked essays. "If you will turn to page thirteen we can continue."

Charlie fumbled with the pages before opening to the correct location. He sat in his seat through lunch—delivered by the timely Ms. Bedell sharply at noon—and listened to Westwood and Markenson alternate in describing personalities, backgrounds, and missions.

He hardly ate any lunch as his stomach was churning unpleasantly. This was going to be a huge project. What had he gotten himself into?

-oOo-

"Megan?" Larry asked gently at the edge of her consciousness.

"Yes?" she whispered unwilling to open her eyes.

"Are you alright?"

Her answer was so different from the last time he'd asked. "Yes." She smiled and it felt real. "Give me another moment."

She made sure to savor another full cycle of breath of womblike darkness so she'd be able to remember what peace felt like. When she did finally open her eyes the first thing she saw was Larry standing before her. He offered her his hand.

She took it and he helped her rise.

"Megan," Jikai mused from behind them. "You are indeed strong and capable."

"What?" Megan asked puzzled at the non sequitur.

"Your name," Brother Jikai grinned, "that is its meaning." The man bowed himself out of the chapel leaving her and Larry alone.

-oOo-

When Don unlocked the front door and pulled off his jacket the first thing he noticed was that it was quiet. The second thing he noticed was that there wasn't anything cooking in the kitchen. After the day he had a bit of home cooked food would have been nice: steak, chicken, salmon, pork chops. Something meaty, filling, and comforting.

Just to make sure his nose wasn't deceiving him Don walked into the kitchen. Nope, there was definitely nothing cooking. To add insult to injury there wasn't any beer in the fridge either. Since Liz was gone that meant he wasn't going to get—well suffice it to say it was going to be a long, lonely night.

"Charlie? You here?" Don bellowed.

A second later he heard Charlie's muffled voice. "Out in the garage."

Don headed to the garage. "You wouldn't believe the shitty day I've—" he cut off when he saw Charlie wasn't alone. A man in a nondescript blue suit lounged on the couch like he owned it while Charlie was scribbling furiously on one of his chalkboards. "Charlie?"

"You're here," Charlie said and put the chalk in the tray and dusted his hands off. "Didn't you get my messages?"

"Yeah, all twelve of them." Don couldn't help but feel the mystery man's gaze bore into him.

"You could have returned one of them."

"I was a bit busy today, sorry." He was sure the apology came across half-assed, but didn't care.

"It would have taken five minutes," Charlie scolded him. Don bristled. His superior officers may be allowed to reprimand him, but his brother should know better than to do so in front of a complete stranger.

Biting his tongue to keep back his true thoughts he instead asked, "Charlie, who is this?"

"Oh!" Charlie said as if he'd just remembered something important. He wiped his hands on his jeans leaving white hand prints behind. "This is Agent Markenson from the NSA."

"The NSA?" My god, what in the _hell_ was going on? This was more than a coincidence. Dolon's words about the Janus List disaster being kept an internal matter rang completely hollow now.

"Yes," Markenson said rising from the couch and extending his hand in greeting. "Agent Eppes, correct?"

Don shook the man's hand firmly and looked him directly in the eye. Markenson looked away first.

"The NSA has a project for me," Charlie chimed in once Don released Markenson's hand.

"A project?" He was sure his voice came out an octave higher than normal. He cleared the frog out of his throat. "Will you excuse us for a moment?" Don asked directly to Markenson.

"Of course. Would you like me to step out?" he jerked his thumb back towards the main house.

"No, that won't be necessary," Don said sweetly all but dragging Charlie out of the room with him.

"You didn't need to act like that." Charlie said once they'd left the garage and the oppressive blackboards.

Shrugging off Charlie's concern he asked, "Where's Dad?"

"He went out with Millie this morning. He said he'd be back for dinner."

Don checked his watch. "It's going on eight o'clock."

"Is it?" Charlie went to check his own watch, but stopped when he realized he wasn't wearing one. "They probably got distracted." Don had to resist the urge to throttle his little brother. If he was forgetting the time and forgetting to eat then the situation with the NSA agent was worse than he originally thought. "There's some chicken breast in the freezer. We can make that if you're hungry," Charlie continued brushing past him and heading into the kitchen

"What are you doing?" Don demanded grabbing Charlie's sleeve again to stop him.

"Going to defrost dinner," Charlie said backing away.

"That's not what I mean."

"The NSA came by this morning. They had a work offer for me."

"Doing what?"

"You know I can't answer that," Charlie said and crossed his arms.

"Doing what?" Don repeated making sure to enunciate each word.

Charlie pursed his lips, but said nothing.

"Does this have to do with the Janus List?" Don tried again.

"Leaving aside the fact that I can't legally tell you that. You haven't exactly been mister communication today, what makes you think I should tell you anything?"

"Because I spent the day—" Markenson could probably hear the whole fight. There wasn't anything else for the man to do at the moment. Lowering his voice Don started over. "Because I have a team falling apart at the seams, because I spent the day being dressed down, being told what do to, and having my judgment questioned by a son of a bitch, only to come home to find you doing—doing whatever the hell it is that you're doing—for the NSA! I can't protect you if I don't know what you're doing."

"I'm a big boy, Don. I've been able to take care of myself for a long time."

This line of questioning clearly wasn't working, so he tried another one. "Can you get out of it?"

That took Charlie aback. "What? Why should I do that?"

"Because I'm asking you to," Don pleaded. "This is going to go way over your head really quick. I don't think you're going to be able to handle it."

"And I don't think you've handled the past few days very well."

"Me?" This argument was insane. "I'm not the one working for the enemy!"

"The NSA is not the enemy."

"Are you sure of that?" Don countered. "What did they offer you?"

"Yes, they are paying me for my work."

"I'm not talking about money," Don said and combed his fingers through his hair. "What did they offer you? Wait!" He held up his hands. "Don't tell me. Two agents knocked on door this morning and flashed their badges. They proceed to ask you for your help on some high up, important National Security matter. And because they asked for you specifically you jumped at the chance to prove your superiority."

Charlie uncrossed his arms and tried to put his hands in his pockets nonchalantly. Don wasn't buying it; he'd hit a nerve. And he'd hit it right on. "That isn't what happened," Charlie denied.

"No? I don't believe you." When Charlie didn't reply Don pushed on. "They are using you to get to me. Don't you realize that?"

"Do you hear yourself?" Charlie returned. "This isn't some mastermind conspiracy. It's actually important work. Look, I'm sorry Colby played you for a fool, but don't go taking it out on _me_. The world doesn't revolve around Don Eppes. They asked for my help. You didn't!"

"Don't talk to me like that!"

"Then don't talk to me like I can't tell the difference between black and white and what's important and what's not," Charlie said, his face blotchy and ugly.

"Forget it. I'm not having this conversation with you anymore."

"You're not staying for dinner, then?" Charlie asked as Don grabbed his jacket and headed for the door.

"What do you think?"

"You should have called, Don."

"Fuck you, Charlie! You made your bed," Don spat. "Lie in it."

As he slammed the front door behind him he heard Charlie call out again. "You forget your mail!"

-oOo-


	4. Pawn's Game

**Note:** Colby and Charlie's chess game is a mimic of the 1905 game between Janowski and Alapin.

** Chapter IV: Pawn's Game **

They did bring him a chess set.

Many self-played games and agonizing hours later, Colby was sick of waiting for word of his release to float down from high. The lack of information was incredibly frustrating, but he also was smart enough to recognize that although Dolon and Westwood may have use for him, it didn't necessarily follow that they trusted him, or wouldn't sacrifice him for their cause. Still, he wasn't willing to look a gift horse in the mouth because he was grateful he wasn't enduring grueling hours of interrogation. He had a part to play in the game they were busy orchestrating and he was cognizant of his role in their gambit.

It was to stay out of sight and shut up.

Pawns didn't question or disobey. They kept their mouths shut even when the water washed over their heads. So he played chess against himself between meals, during meals, and probably in his dreams. He was getting very good at winning.

And losing.

He sincerely hoped everyone watching his video footage was bored silly. Colby sighed and studied the chess board once again.

Someone walked past the porthole window outside his cell, and for a brief moment his heartbeat skyrocketed and as he shut his eyes, he was five years younger in another cell, in another hell. He didn't move until the footsteps faded far into the distance. The only sounds in the room were the high-pitched whine of the surveillance camera and that of his own shaky breathing.

Inhale. Exhale. There is a chess board in front of him, not a gun pointed at his head. Inhale. Exhale. He squinted his eyes open. The light here was a powerful fluorescent, not a dim single incandescent bulb. Instead of—

"Damn it!" Furious, he shoved the chess board across the table.

He didn't want to relive it!

Most of the white chessmen slid forward several ranks into the center, while half the black ones toppled over and the other half hit the floor. He'd promised himself he wouldn't let the blank walls get to him. He'd lived through hell once for these people; he shouldn't be required to do it again. And yet, here he was.

Here he was playing himself—second guessing himself—and he still couldn't see the whole situation clearly.

The scattered pieces on the floor and the board made everything look clear cut: black and white, good and evil. If only real life wasn't tinged in shades of grey. He bent and scooped up a pair of knights, a rook, and several pawns and laid them on the table. He managed to reach the fallen king, but another pawn was under table and too far out of his reach. What kind of protector was he when he couldn't even keep within the rules? The allure of a peaceful white was a beautiful dream. One he would never believe in again.

To his surprise his cell door opened and the guard he had nicknamed Bruno for his doglike appearance came in and escorted—of all people—Charlie Eppes into the room. Colby immediately stood up, king still clutched in his hand. "Charlie?"

"Colby," Charlie greeted him. He looked perfectly groomed in comparison to Colby's wrinkled detention denim. When the guard came in with his dinner he should remember to ask for a toothbrush.

"What're you doing here?" Colby asked, mindful of the camera trained on them. He really wanted to ask why Don had allowed him to come. Don would never have allowed this visit.

Before Charlie could answer the guard cut in. "I'll be outside if you need me." The door bolted shut behind him. Just the prisoner and the professor now…oh…and about twenty professional profilers kibitzing on their conversation, watching his performance. He'd better play it to the hilt.

"That's odd, he insisted on staying while I talked with Carter," Charlie said somewhat puzzled.

His heart sank further. "You spoke to Dwayne?"

"'Bout an hour ago," Charlie admitted looking at Colby's mangled chess game.

Colby shrugged. "Maybe he felt I was less of a threat."

"Maybe. Odd though…" Charlie trailed off and looked around the sparse setting: a narrow bed, a rickety table, a stained urinal, and the jumbled chess set.

Colby needed to put an end to this line of thought if Charlie wasn't going to put the pieces together and figure out why his security arrangements weren't quite as stringent as his former friend's.

"Charlie, what _are_ you doing here?" Colby asked as he set the king back down on the board. Time to defend it even if he didn't believe it was the best ruler. His country may have its faults, but it was, he honestly believed, the least bad one.

"I came to ask you some questions." Charlie said reaching to grab the errant pawn, rolling it between his empty hands.

"And not take any notes? I don't believe I've seen you without chalk, ballpoint pen, or a dry erase marker for quite sometime." Charlie looked lost without them at his side; Colby felt lost without his gun at his.

"One of the conditions for me to speak with you was that I couldn't take notes," Charlie confessed.

"If you really want some be sure to ask for the video," Colby waved to the camera high up in one of the corners. Charlie's gaze followed the gesture and he frowned at the ever present reminder of the necessary evil of big brother government. "Have a seat then," Colby said as he sat himself. "I'm sorry I can't offer you much more than that at the moment."

Charlie sat still fumbling with the chess piece, but didn't offer any more conversation.

"Don know you're here?"

"Not exactly."

The way Charlie avoided his eyes told him there was a plethora of information jammed in between those two words.

"Okay…. He doesn't know I'm here and probably wouldn't be too pleased if he did know."

Colby imagined that was something of an understatement. Don would go through the roof. "I'm not in a position to tell him," Colby reassured him. As a distraction he started to return the chess pieces to their starting positions. The previous game hadn't been one of his best—for either side. He was looking forward to starting fresh once Charlie had left. "If Don doesn't know, then who granted you permission to come?"

"I didn't know you played," Charlie replied pointing to the board and ignoring the question.

"I'm hardly a Grandmaster, but it's been a semi-serious hobby for the past few years." Since the winter of 2001 when his Special Forces unit was shipped to Afghanistan, to be exact.

"Would you like to play now?" Charlie asked putting his pawn on the board.

"If you'll tell me who sent you."

"The NSA requested my help."

"I'm sure the NSA didn't send you in here to play chess with me."

"No, but I'm sure I'd make much better opponent than you've had in the past forty-eight hours."

"You would."

Although he didn't particularly want to, he finished setting up the board. Quiet as a mouse Charlie helped him.

"Black or white?" Charlie asked.

Without hesitation Colby replied, "White," and turned the board so Charlie sat behind the black pieces. Colby moved the center queen's pawn out two spaces to begin the game.

Charlie countered with the same move.

"Why are you here?" He slid another pawn out to threaten Charlie's.

Charlie looked up and grinned. "Right now I'm here to take your king."

"Don always said you were competitive."

"Don's right," Charlie said and moved another pawn out.

Knight. Bishop.

Knight. Knight.

"What does the NSA have you working on?" Colby asked and brought his own bishop out to play.

"I'm probably just a, well, you know…"—Charlie held up a pawn—"but Victor Westwood had hired me to do some analysis." Charlie said and put the piece down on the far edge.

Colby's hand hesitated over his bishop. If Westwood was responsible for this little interview, then Colby knew for sure this was bad. It was a brilliant plan he had to admit. Hire a genius to work on their major problem while at the same time strong arming Don to cooperate. That made Charlie the bait. Putting his mind on the game he moved the bishop back from the pawn's challenge. "Don't sell yourself short. You're more powerful than a pawn."

"You're right." Charlie said as he captured the second pawn Colby had put into action.

Pawn. Pawn.

Bishop. Pawn.

"I assume your visit has something to do with Ashby's Janus List." Colby slid his bishop to a more secure b3.

Charlie paused to consider the board and the statement for a moment before taking his second knight from the back rank. "Yes."

"You seem quite coy for someone who is here to ask me questions," Colby said and moved his queen in front of his king.

"I'm trying to find the best way to approach the subject."

"Ask. I don't have anything better to do right now."

Charlie picked up one of his pawns and cradled in his palm. Colby sincerely hoped he wasn't going to have to lie. Again. For Charlie's own good.

"Why did you bug Ashby's apartment for the Chinese?"

Colby had to stifle a laugh. In one question Charlie had shown more insight than his brother. "Because I was told to."

"I've read your classified file." The urge to laugh died. "I know you were held prisoner in China for nineteen days. So, I'd find it hard to believe that you'd obey them willingly." Charlie put the pawn down on the board.

If Westwood had given Charlie that much information then Charlie was deep into his clutches. He needed to protect them both here, but he also had his orders, which was what had gotten him into this mess in the first place. "And you think you know how a prisoner would feel?"

"Hypothetically?"

Game forgotten for a moment, Colby crossed his arms over his chest. "This isn't hypothetical. You're talking to a former prisoner. It isn't something you could possibly understand locked up in your ivory tower. There comes a point when you do what they ask and damn the consequences," Colby said, his voice as hard as steel.

That made Charlie gulp. "How were you captured?" he changed the subject.

"Dwayne Carter and I were sent into China for a covert mission. We were caught. I'm sure it was all in the report you read about me."

"Yes, but the whole nature of your mission was blacked out."

"Blacked out for good reason."

"I'm sure." Charlie rubbed his chin and studied the arrangement of the pieces. "The list Ashby left on Naomi Vaughn's voice mail isn't the Janus list."

"Are you sure?"

"Quite."

"If it's a fake list, then why'm I still here?"

"Because you admitted to working for the Chinese."

"So you believe I'm a Chinese agent?"

"You and others have gone a long way to make it seem so."

To cover his unease Colby returned his concentration to the chessmen. All his pieces were set up to make the protection of castling to the king's side more than practical. It also had the advantage of using his newly uncovered rook aggressively. Decision made he castled.

Charlie mimicked the move with his own pieces. "Who told you to put the Chinese bug in Ashby's apartment?" Charlie asked.

Colby moved his rook and evaded the question. "Charlie, it isn't your place to rescue me. I'm sure your brother would have even more choice words to say about it if you did." Colby looked at the bishop that Charlie was sure to move next. "I don't need you to take my confession either."

"That's fair," he said and did indeed move the bishop. "Then I'll ask another question: Why didn't you kill Naomi Vaughn?"

To delay Colby tapped his fingers rhythmically on the edge of the board. He needed to center himself and it was pathetic that he was resorting to this technique against questioning by little Charlie Eppes.

Charlie pressed his advantage. "Logically, if you were a Chinese spy you would have done anything to protect yourself. You should have killed her."

"And if I wasn't told to kill the reporter?" Colby moved his rook.

"You were ordered to kill her." Charlie moved his own rook.

"Yes, I was." Just not by the Chinese. "There's a line in the Army Special Forces creed that I haven't been able to get out of my head for the past two days: 'I am a professional soldier. I will teach and fight wherever my nation requires. I will strive always, to excel in every art and artifice of war.'"

"And you believe the case is comparable to war?"

"I do." He should have said did. Past tense. He wasn't about to be allowed to touch this case any time soon. They'd make sure of that. Thankfully Charlie seemed to busy thinking over his answer to notice. While Charlie thought, Colby looked to the arrangement of the pieces. There was a tide-turning move here, he could feel it.

"Do you also approach chess as a war?" he asked a few moments later interrupting Colby's concentration.

"In a way. The goal is obviously to capture the opponent's king, but I don't adhere to a specific strategy to do so. Instead I look board and the pieces as a whole." The pawn or the knight? "The relationships the pieces form usually provide an answer without having to play the game forward in your mind very far, or at all." The knight to e5! Colby smiled as he moved the piece. It was an excellent development play that would block the black pieces and also press all of his into active service.

Charlie blew out a breath as he studied the movement. "I wasn't expecting that."

"My answer? Or my move?"

"Either," he admitted.

"You don't think of chess as a war?" Colby asked and sat back trying not to gloat.

"No, I approach it as a problem that has an optimal solution."

"And how is that different from a war?"

Charlie replied as he picked up one of his knights to capture Colby's. "It's a zero sum game yes, but…Deep Blue…" Charlie trailed off. His expression went completely blank as he rehashed some complex mathematical problem to find enlightenment.

"Charlie?" There was no response. "Charlie?" Colby tried again.

"The Minimax algorithm," Charlie stated in a hush like he was revealing a top secret government plan.

"Yeah?" Colby drew out the single syllable word and leaned back accepting that the chess game wasn't going to be finished anytime in the near future. Here comes the nearly incomprehensible math speak, he could feel it.

"The Minimax algorithm is something used in decision theory to minimize the maximum amount of loss. For each state, or move in chess, you assign a value to how good of state it is. Positive is good and negative is bad. The best play is the one that several moves ahead does the least amount of damage to the end goal, winning the game. It's the technique that IBM's Deep Blue used to play Garry Kasparov." Charlie stuck his hands in his pockets but came up empty. "I could analyze in the same way! I need—"

"To find a piece of chalk?" Colby asked wryly.

"Umm…yeah…" Charlie ran a hand through his mussed up hair and scooted his chair back to stand. He balled a fist to rap on the door, but he turned and searched for Colby's eyes as if something else had struck him. "They'd already made the decision when they sent you in."

"What?" Colby asked, not following.

"You were an acceptable loss to Falcon's Blessing. It was luck you got out again."

Colby just blinked. How did Charlie jump from chess to treason and espionage?

"Never mind," Charlie said and did knock on the door. "I don't need an answer. You probably shouldn't answer it."

Still stunned, Colby couldn't find words.

Bruno opened and then half closed before Charlie looked back at him again. "Is there anything, you'd like me to tell anyone?"

I'm sorry. "No." Don't forget me. "No, there's nothing."

"Goodbye, Colby."

"Except…"

"Yes?"

"Be careful, will you?"

"Don't worry about me," Charlie tried to wave the question away.

"I'm serious. Watch yourself. You're treading on dangerous ground. Ask yourself what kind of people you're working for."

That reached him and Charlie looked taken aback. "I know who I'm working for. They're the same people you've been working for."

The guard bolted the door shut and Colby waited until the footfalls were long gone before he could face the chess set again. The hum of the surveillance camera seemed almost loud enough to drown out his breathing. It was only through sheer luck that he'd survived, luck that Westwood had been more than eager to employ elsewhere. He _had_ been an acceptable loss.

So was Charlie, but he didn't even know it.

-oOo-

Megan sat down at her desk and punched in her security code to collect her phone messages. "Agent Reeves, this is Naomi Vaughn from the LA Ledger." As if Megan could forget the woman over the past weekend. "I'm working on a story about the events of the past few days." Of course she was. What else would a fluff ball reporter do? "And I was hoping to speak with you. Please call me"—not in this lifetime—"at 555-8784 at your earliest convenience."

She slammed the phone down in disgust.

"Naomi Vaughn?" David asked, swiveling his chair around to face her.

"Yeah. How'd you know?"

"She's already left messages for both me and Don trying to wrangle up interviews. I figured she'd try and hit you up next."

"I can see the headline now." Megan arced a hand in the air tracing invisible words. "Spy within the FBI. FBI arrests one of its own. FBI bungles espionage case." She snorted and dropped her hand into her lap. "I'm half surprised it hasn't already been plastered all over the news. Richard Miller, Robert Hassen, and Colby Granger. He's gotten his name next to some _really_ illustrious former agents."

"At least there's no wife, or sex tapes," David replied.

"That we know of," Megan said grimly. "I just wish I could make his actions line up with the man I know. Ms. Vaughn will no doubt spin Friday's events into something sensational."

"It is possible she has some class."

"Have you ever met a reporter who actually has class?"

"I think you're redirecting your anger at Colby," David said looking her straight in the eyes and refusing to rise to her bait.

Megan realized she was dry washing her hands in her lap and clasped them together to stop the restless action. If she was completely honest with herself she would have to admit that she was angry with Colby. She'd poured her heart out to him at sunset and not four hours later he abandoned her to Black Rain's paid assassins. So yes, she was angry. Very, very angry. "When did you apply for my job?"

"Just keeping the seat warm for you."

She smiled. "Okay… Okay. I'll be positive. She's a very persistent reporter. That work for you?"

David laughed.

"Has Don let her know we can't talk about it?"

That stopped David's laughter cold. "I—ummm—haven't exactly spoken with Don since yesterday morning."

"Oh?" She raised an eyebrow.

"After he met with Dolon yesterday he wasn't in the best of moods." Megan held her peace when it seemed there was something more David wanted to add, but couldn't bring himself to. "We searched Colby's apartment earlier," he finally admitted. "We had a fight just before we finished."

"That was a monumentally stupid thing to do," Megan scolded him.

"The fight or the search?" he asked trying for levity.

"Come to think of it picking a fight with the boss is never a smart thing to do, but I mean searching Colby's apartment. What on Earth possessed you?"

David scuffed the floor with his shoe not contradicting her. "It seemed like a good idea at the time. I wanted to try and understand why he did what he did. We've all worked side-by-side for two years. Sure he's been gone time to time and has missed some cases, which in twenty-twenty hindsight is suspicious and…" he trailed off.

"And?" she prompted.

"I want another chance to speak with him."

Megan saw David stiffen as Don stormed into their area of the bullpen. "Well, you'll get your chance," Don announced.

"What?"

Don slammed a folder down on his own desk. "He's going to be released."

That stunned both Megan and David into silence for a full five seconds.

"When?" she asked.

"How?" David asked an eyeblink later.

"Tomorrow," Don grunted and sank into his chair. "As for how I'm sure my gross incompetence will figure into it somehow." He sighed. "I'm sure Assistant Director Dolon is in the process of pulling some hefty strings to make the situation into whatever he wants."

"What do you mean?" Megan asked.

"The official party line will be that this has been a large misunderstanding, the grand delusions of a mad man, who we unwisely believed."

Colby had confessed to planting the bug. She heard him. How were they going to sweep it all under the rug? "That doesn't make—" Megan started, but cut off when she saw the glare Don shot her.

"Have the two of you also received calls from Naomi Vaughn?"

She and David nodded.

"I want you two to meet with her."

"Are you sure that's a good idea?" Megan asked. "We can just not return her calls. Surely she'd figure the message out."

"I don't care how insistent she is," Don continued ignoring her suggestion, "but you two will need to quash any desire she has to write whatever she's planning on writing. If we ignore her she'd still write her story, which is exactly what the Assistant Director"—he nearly spat the name—"doesn't want to see happen. Consider it an order I was given that I'm now giving to you."

"I'll give her a call," David offered.

"We can set up lunch," Megan said through gritted teeth.

"Good. Make sure you keep me out of it," Don snapped and left for the kitchen.

"He's Mister Charming today," Megan muttered as soon as Don was out of hearing range.

"We have Osteen, Clarke, Hensley, and Roybal to thank for that."

Before David had gotten the fifth name all the way out Megan felt her eyes go very wide. She tried to form words, but she could only gape at him. There's no way he should have know them. No way at all.

"What?" he asked puzzled.

"Where did you get that list of people?"

"What do you mean?" he asked puzzled.

"Where?"

He looked at her like she'd fallen off the deep end. "They're some of the names of the Americans who were spying against us that turned up later on the Janus List."

"That's not possible."

"What are you talking about?" David scanned his desk and picked up a piece of paper. "Haven't you seen the full list?"

"No." Friday had been too hectic of a night and besides Colby and Carter no one had told her who else was on the list. It wasn't necessary. Plus she hadn't been in any condition to even think to ask to see it on Saturday morning.

"Take a look," David said and handed her the list.

She felt the blood drain from her face. Amid the one hundred and eighty-six names they were there. All of them! Osteen, Clarke, Hensley, Roybal, Thornhill, Allard, Harrington, Wong, Vanhook! There were only names on a white piece of paper, but she could imagine their photographed faces as clear as day. She'd spent six weeks staring at their surveillance photos. She'd spent six weeks listening to their voices on questionably retrieved phone taps. She could hear Clarke's arrogant tone of voice as well as Harrington's lisp as if they were speaking two feet in front of her.

"Megan? Are you alright?"

No. No. No! NO!

This wasn't happening. This couldn't be happening. Black Rain had shown itself willing to kill for this list and the FBI and NSA had already known some of the names. Megan's mind started to spin. If they knew the American names then did they know those of the other countries? Did they know Ashby was going to make a scene?

They'd known the events two _days_ ago were going to happen two _months_ ago! Megan stood with woozy legs. "The Assistant Director is using the spare office down the hall?"

"Personally overseeing the continuing investigation," David said. "We are to report to him directly."

"What?"

"Instead of Don. We are to report to him."

"When did that happen?"

"Yesterday afternoon."

She reread the list to make sure she wasn't hallucinating and her eyes caught and lingered on Colby's name. Odd that she'd been researching and profiling all those American spies except for Carter and Granger. She smelled a rat.

"Will you excuse me for a moment?" She handed David the list as she passed him.

He caught her by the arm before she could get very far. "You're not okay."

"I'm fine." She wanted to tell him everything, but she stopped herself just in time. "Call Ms. Vaughn. Tell her I'd be delighted to meet her for lunch tomorrow," she said and charged through the office not seeing anything or anyone except for the names on that blasted piece of paper.

She got to the Assistant Director's office and discovered the door was already open. Pausing for a moment to catch her breath (thank you Brother Jikai) she hesitated even longer when she heard voices arguing inside.

"He's asked for permission?" She overheard Dolon ask someone.

"Yes, for the file," the second man said. Megan knew that voice, but couldn't immediately place it.

"I told you it was a bad idea to involve him. I told you to wait."

"It's done. Besides we can handle it if he gets to be too much trouble."

"Fine." The inflection in his voice suggested it was far from fine. "And you granted your permission?"

"Unless you have any objections I plan to." It was Victor Westwood! If he was here then there was no possible way her special assignment had been a fluke. She didn't need Charlie to calculate how possible it was for this to all be a coincidence.

"No, I have no objections. In fact we can use this as an opportunity to divide and conquer," Dolon replied.

Wanting to listen more, but also knowing she shouldn't be caught eavesdropping, Megan gave a brief courtesy knock on the open door jamb to announce her presence.

"Ahhh, Agent Reeves," the Assistant Director said rising from his chair. Westwood turned around to face her. "I believe you know Victor Westwood." Oh, she knew Victor Westwood and his condescending attitude all too well. Six weeks of departmental cooperation had been a blast.

"Yes, sir, I do." She nodded in Westwood's general direction.

"Excellent," he said and offered her a chair. "I was hoping to talk with you yesterday, but I learned you'd taken the day off."

"I did," she said slipping into the chair he indicated. It was still slightly warm with body heat; this must have been where Westwood had been sitting minutes before. Behind her Westwood closed the door so the three of them could have a private conversation.

"Did Agent Eppes want you to take the day off?" Dolon asked catching her off guard and she felt her eyebrows knit together.

"It was his suggestion," she admitted.

Dolon leaned back in his chair and it squeaked. He sighed. "That's what I feared. Did he order you to?"

He couldn't know what she'd intended to do yesterday morning. She swallowed nervously. "Excuse me?"

Instead of answering he asked her another question. "Have you mentioned your familiarity with the names on the Janus List to anyone? I do trust you've seen it by now."

"I've seen it," she said darkly. She probably shouldn't mention that she'd been a hairsbreadth away from blurting everything out to David five minutes earlier. Since she hadn't done so she could still answer truthfully. "And I've told no one."

"Good. I was concerned over the fact Agent Eppes gave you the day off. I'd worried that he'd put two and two together and figured out the nature of your previous assignment was directly related to the names on the Janus List and tried to get you out of the way while he conducted a questionable search of Granger's place. I'm most unimpressed with his actions."

Which explained why they were to now reporting directly to him instead of Don.

She cleared her throat. "He only knew I was doing profiling work under the guidelines set down in the Patriot Act. He didn't know anything else."

Dolon leaned back in the chair behind his massive desk and let out a sigh of relief.

"I'm certain you have questions," Westwood said from his position behind her. She had to crane her neck around to see him.

Bet your ass she had questions! She had accusations too, but was smart enough to realize those would only get her into trouble. "How did the FBI and NSA already have a several names on the Janus List?" She impressed herself with how calm she sounded: cool, collected, under control.

Barely.

"We've known for sometime that Ashby had been compiling a Janus List. In fact, we've assisted in that compilation in order to control him and the information as long as possible."

And then it clicked home. "You just didn't think he'd be putting your spies on the list as well."

"No and now we're worried that the information may be sold to a third party," Westwood revealed.

"And the poisoning?"

"Dwayne Carter acted alone."

Megan wished she could believe that.

"Which was most unfortunate," Dolon said picking up the thread. "We've been putting out false information to bolster the idea that the list is a fake."

"But it isn't?" she asked.

"No," Westwood replied. "Some of it is," he amended. "We've managed to slip a few false leads in to solidify our position, but the majority of the list is true."

"Colby?" Megan asked tentatively trying to keep the hope out of her heart. "I learned a few minutes ago he was to be released."

"He'll be transferred to continue his work for us elsewhere."

Her next thought, which came hard on the heels of that revelation, was that they should be talking to Don about this. He was senior; she was junior.

"Why are you telling me this?" Megan asked listening to the warning bells.

"Your work in the Los Angeles office has been exemplary," Dolon said promptly. "Your profiling skills would be invaluable in the fight against terror. The hard work you've been assigned in the past six weeks was the final test and—if you're willing—we've decided we'd like you to take a more active role in analysis. Have you ever considered running your own team?"

Her own team? Don was right to have been concerned to about losing her to the DOJ. Her eyes went wide and she stuttered trying to think of something coherent to say, something—anything—that would conceal her repugnance and fury. These men had torn Colby away from the team and they were clearly involved in trying to remove Don from the equation. And they were using her to hasten his fall!

Both men chuckled at her tongue-tied attempt at speech. "You don't have to decide anything on the spot," Dolon said misinterpreting her expression.

"The Assistant Director is correct. Before you answer please give our offer some thought," Westwood said and shook her hand firmly as she rose to her feet. "You could become a major player in the war against America's enemies."

"I will," she managed to get out as she tried to shut out the buzzing in her ears that threatened to overwhelm her.

Megan walked half-stunned to her desk. Her hand shook as she reached into her desk and pulled out the letter she'd written in the dark early Saturday morning. She didn't open it; she simply held it, a letter light as a feather, but containing emotions heavier than lead.

However, she'd promised Don two weeks so she stuffed it back into the drawer for later. She'd always kept her word. Always kept her oath….

She hoped to hell Don was still going to be around to hand it to.

-oOo-


	5. Absent Employees

** Chapter V: Absent Employees **

Several feet from the glass doors Colby stopped, turned around, and headed to the patch of handrail bathed in sunlight. Gripping the rail as a lifeline he looked down into the courtyard below and he forced himself to watch as people, shadows, and cars went about their business as if it were any other normal day. Dizzy with lack of sleep and anxiousness he fought his nerves and spun around. Still keeping one hand firmly clutching the rail behind him he eyed the doors again. He'd walked into the FBI office through them from the walkway bridge a thousand times before: making coffee runs, analyzing cases, joking with David, stretching his legs, and going at home late at night.

Today, with the oblivious passers-bys scurrying around him and the end of his life in Los Angeles hanging over his head, it wasn't a normal day.

Not even close.

Westwood had driven him directly from the detention facility and dropped him off at the side entrance like he was disposing of a troublesome child late for school. He should have thought to ask for a quick trip home to change into some more professional clothing before showing up at the office.

They'd given him back the same brown jacket, sweat soaked T-shirt, and blue jeans he'd worn the night they'd arrested him. He was sure he smelled akin to a rotting dump truck too. Well, it wasn't like he was going to need to make a good first impression because he doubted he'd ever return. So, what did it matter?

Steeling himself, Colby unclenched his hand from the rail and walked through the glass doors with his head held high. He passed through the security checkpoint relatively quickly with the new credentials, hanging like a heavy yoke around his neck, which Assistant Director Dolon had reissued for him. The guard at the desk did a double take when he realized who he was admitting into the building, but didn't protest.

Entering the elevator—the very same shaft David and Megan had marched him out of wearing handcuffs on Friday night—gave him pause, but he swallowed and pushed the button for the sixth floor as if this was any other day.

A young, dishwater-blonde woman he'd never seen before entered the elevator on the third floor and smiled up at him. She was laden down with armfuls of research books, file folders, and papers. "Can you hit the button for the seventh floor for me? I'd hate to get stuck in here."

Despite his misery he grinned. "Me too." Colby pressed the number seven button and it lit up bright, glowing orange: work was a seventh heaven for her and for him it was a threatening, warning orange. She was normal and belonged here; he was abnormal and belonged locked away in a dark, dark cell.

"Long stakeout?" she asked surveying him from head to toe. He was grateful she didn't wrinkle her nose in disgust.

"Something like that," he grunted as the doors slid closed.

She didn't glare at him with distrust or suspicion and he knew the moment he stepped off the elevator he was bound to be noticed so he relished her gift of a few seconds of anonymity. Maybe the elevator getting stuck wouldn't be so bad after all. Then he'd never have to face Don and his anger and disappointment.

All too soon the bell for the sixth floor dinged and the doors whooshed apart revealing frantic activity and babbling conversation.

"Good luck with your case," she called as he stepped over the elevator's threshold.

"Thanks," he said and realized he meant it.

The office noise wasn't any different than normal, but what wasn't normal was the fact that conversations died as he passed workstation after workstation. He shifted his shoulders, but refused to acknowledge those he left staring in his wake.

When Colby rounded the last corner he saw all three of them—Megan, David, and Don—with their heads bent studying several pieces of paper spread out across Don's desk. Never letting his stride falter he went to meet them.

If only Dwayne had never rescued him from a burning Humvee, if only his valiant actions in Afghanistan hadn't caught Westwood's notice, if only he'd never seen the sun rise with a feather clutched in his hand, if only he'd never had such great friends to help him pull his life together again, and if only…. Sigh. The "if onlys" were as dangerous as they were seductive.

It was time to follow the fate Dolon and Westwood had paved for him. He didn't have any other choice; his friends couldn't help him, wouldn't help him even if he broke down enough to ask.

Colby cleared his throat to get their attention. "Hello," he greeted them.

They lined up to face him forming a solid wall against him. He knew he'd never scale it and convince them of the reasons for why he'd lied to them. David had his arms crossed firmly across his chest with his head cocked to the side studying Colby. At least David wasn't charging at him ready to attack like he'd done Friday. Megan was the one he thought would be the most ready to understand because of her profiler skills, but she was holding back and wasn't even looking him in the eyes. And Don—Don made sure to look at him boldly and directly, a man in charge to the very last.

His friends all looked like heaven and they all looked like hell.

"You must have some very powerful friends, Granger," Don said breaking the stalemate.

Colby closed his eyes briefly. "I have other friends too," he said softly.

"Do you really?" Don asked skeptically. "Who?"

That cut to his heart as quick as a knife. This was going to be harder than he feared.

"Despite everything that's happened. I still consider you, all of you,"—he corrected himself to include David and Megan—"friends."

"I tend to trust my friends," Don said, his voice as strong as a diamond. Neither Megan nor David bothered to contradict him either.

Colby realized that he didn't have the time—or quite frankly the energy—to change their minds. What's done was done and there was no going back now. With their feelings perfectly evident he decided to stick to business; he'd play his role to the hilt. "No you don't," he replied to Don. It was an accurate observation and Colby watched it hit Don hard, but he plowed on. "I've come to request a transfer." Colby was surprised at how calm his voice sounded.

"I've heard," Don replied in that same hollow, deadly tone.

Colby bit back an impatient sigh. "I was told you'd have the paperwork ready for me to fill out."

"Yes."

Don sure wasn't going to make this easy and Megan and David still weren't saying anything. "Is it ready?"

"Almost. Let me go and get it. Why don't you take the time to pack your personal belongings up?" Don pointed to an empty cardboard printer paper box splashed with an Office Depot logo someone had the foresight to put on his desk. "Megan and David will watch over you."

Colby swallowed and nodded in agreement. "Okay."

Don departed and Colby pulled open the top drawer of his desk and reached behind the stapler for the backup envelope of money he kept at the office for emergency cab rides or food runs. He closed the top drawer and opened the second one, piling stuff into the box without really seeing what he was grabbing.

Megan ignored him and went to her own desk. When Colby glanced at her he noticed that she was simply staring into the space before her. David, on the other hand, came in close and leaned on the side of his desk. "Don't let me bother you, David. I'm sure you have more important things to do. I'll be out of your hair soon enough," Colby said to him.

David didn't budge and instead shuffled his feet while he stalled for time to figure out exactly what he wanted to say. "Don's had a rough few days."

"_Don's_ had a rough few days? That's really rich."

"You admitted to planning a Chinese bug!"

"And _you_ never asked why."

David flinched, but didn't bother to deny it. "Don shouldn't have been that harsh."

"He's doing what he's supposed to do. And so am I." There wasn't anything else he needed or wanted in the second drawer. All that was left behind in the third were paperclips and pens, so he slammed it shut with more force than necessary.

"I'm sorry."

"Don't apologize for him," Colby snapped.

"I was apologizing for… I'm not… I'm trying to…" David trailed off to collect his thoughts.

"You clearly want something. What is it?"

"I want to know why," David blurted out.

"Why what?" Colby gave him a wintry smile and then peered into the box. It was half empty; his life at the Los Angeles FBI office should be worth more than that. Maybe it wasn't. "The moment for asking that is long past."

"And I'm asking now."

"Why'd I lie to you?" Because I didn't know what else to do. "Why didn't I mention some of the not so 'squeaky-clean' parts of my life?" Because I wanted you to like me. "Why?" Because this should have been just a temporary stop. "You want to know why I planted the bug, David? Because I was ordered to," Colby shrugged and he knew it was callous and unfeeling.

And he no longer cared.

"You're no Williams, that's for sure," David sneered.

Ends were always messy: girlfriends always dumped him, parents passed away while he was overseas, Army buddies died under enemy fire. Coworkers, who _weren't_ friends, shouldn't be any different, but he'd lived through enough endings that he knew one more shouldn't bother him in the long run.

David reached into Colby's personal space and picked up the team photo on the desk. "Remember when this was taken?" he asked.

"Vividly."

It had been the first time he'd let his guard down and relaxed around his new team. It had been the first time they'd felt like family. David handed the frame to him and Colby could see that the glass now had a gigantic crack running diagonal through the pane. He didn't want to know how that had happened. Not like it mattered. He returned the photo to its home on the desk. It should stay here; Los Angeles was where it belonged.

"You don't want to take it with you?" Was there a touch of hurt in David's voice?

"No," Colby said. "I won't need it where I'm going."

"Which is where?" Megan piped up for the first time.

"Does it matter?"

"It might. Colby, do you know Owen Roybal?" she asked.

Colby blinked at the non sequitur. He'd never heard of the man before in his life. "Who?"

"Never mind," she murmured. "It doesn't matter."

Don chose that moment to return and join the awkward conversation. "You're not a team player," Don said handing him the transfer papers, "and in my notes I'll explicitly say that I wouldn't trust you, but I'm sure you and the Assistant Director will find everything else in order. My opinion clearly hasn't mattered one iota in anything about this case," Don added bitterly.

Colby bit back a sharp retort, and instead said, "If there isn't anything else, then I'll go."

"You will."

Colby put his transfer papers on the top of the other paraphernalia in the box and propped it against his side. He glanced from Don's hard expression to David's wounded expression to Megan's thoughtful expression. He thought about offering his hand to shake, but didn't think he could take the rejection if it was refused. He didn't want to end it this way….

Finally he decided on a warning. "Watch out for Charlie," Colby cautioned.

Don got up in his face to growl. "You stay away from my brother."

"It's not _me_ you should be worried about." Colby didn't budge an inch.

"Then just who should I be worried about, Granger, humm?"

"You're referring to Westwood?" Megan asked sharply. Colby whirled to face her unable to keep the shock from his face. For the first time that day Megan looked him straight in the eyes. "You're referring to Westwood," she repeated slowly. This time it wasn't a question and Colby nodded.

"Who?" David asked while Colby gathered his wits.

"He works for the NSA," Megan answered never breaking eye contact. "How do you know Victor Westwood, Colby?"

He wished he could answer honestly, tell them everything, tell them what kind of trap they were in the middle of, but he knew he was treading in dangerous shark infested waters. He didn't want to jeopardize anyone's safety. He deliberately looked away from Megan and faced Don. "Your brother's playing with the big boys. They don't like to lose and they have money and power to assure that won't." It wasn't much, but it was all he could give them as a going away present.

"And they have the perfect foot soldier in you," Don said throwing it back in his face.

"I am what I've always been," Colby said simply and turned away. "Goodbye," he said over his shoulder. Of all the previous endings none of the others had left as many loose ends dangling as this one.

He'd just have to do his best to cut the ribbons he'd left trailing behind.

-oOo-

"What would you like to order?"

Megan had her cell phone pressed against her ear listening to the tone on the other end ring, so David replied for her. "We're still waiting on a friend."

Candy—the waitress's name was emblazed on her nametag—eyed the rapidly dwindling lunch crowd and wasn't to be easily detoured. "Would you like something to drink while you wait? We have Coke, strawberry lemonade, ice tea."

"The water I already have will be fine," David replied.

Getting Naomi Vaughn's recorded message for the fifth time in a quarter of an hour Megan sighed and flipped her phone closed. "Ice tea."

"Plain, peach, tropical, strawberry, or raspberry?" the waitress rattled off without missing a beat.

"Raspberry."

"Coming right up," she said and sauntered away. As Megan put her phone down on the still slightly sticky table she couldn't help but think that Colby would have cracked some joke about a waitress named Candy working at a place called Cane's Diner as soon as she was safely out of earshot and all the way behind the counter. Megan shook her head to banish the thought.

Would she ever stop thinking about him? There had been that split second earlier that morning when she mentioned Westwood that they'd had a connection. She was sure of it, but Colby had pushed it away. Far, far away. It would have been nice to have someone to lean on, someone who understood…

"No answer?" David asked.

"No. How much longer do you want to wait?"

David checked his watch. "Another twenty minutes and I'd call it good."

Megan reached for the dish full of Sugar in the Raw, Splenda, and Sweet'N Low for something to occupy her hands. She plucked one of the packets out and shook all the sweetener into one end. The soft strands of Bryan Adam's _It Ain't Over Yet_ started to play overhead.

"I talked with Claudia this morning," David volunteered to fill the silence. She could tell he needed to talk about anything else but Colby.

"Yeah?" She turned the pink packet upside down and let the grains fall back the other way.

He took another swig of water. "Later in the week she agreed to let me take her out to the Dodgers game."

"Sounds like fun," she said without any enthusiasm. Fake sugar, fake friends, fake family, fake job offer. Did a fake job beget a fake life? Or did they simply coexist?

"I'm just glad she said yes," he continued and took another sip, but didn't make eye contact with her. "Don said you went out to see Larry."

She turned the Sweet'N Low packet over again. "Yeah."

"And?" David prompted.

"He's planning on staying at the monastery for another couple of days until he makes up his mind about what apartment he wants to move into."

"Megan…" David reached out and stopped her from flipping the packet a third time. She looked up startled. The clunk of high heels announced Candy's return and he released her. The waitress slid Megan's iced tea across the table. She leaned over the table quite amply to show off and to top off David's water in the process. She wore too much eyeliner and way too much perfume.

Colby wouldn't have been able to resist the joke that's for sure.

To delay the conversation she drank her raspberry tea. It was a touch too bitter and she ripped open the packet and dumped the contents onto the ice cubes floating on the surface. With the thin red straw she mixed the sweetener into the drink.

"I tried to give Don a letter of resignation the other day."

Glass halfway to his mouth, David paused, and put it back down on the table with a thunk. "You gave two weeks notice?"

"No. Don convinced me to wait two weeks. He'd accept it then."

"If this is about Colby…"

"It's not about Colby! It's about me," she snapped. Seeing his look she amended, "Okay maybe part of my reasoning is because of Colby's betrayal, but not most of it." She sipped the ice tea through the tiny straw. Now it was too sweet.

"Then it has to do with this Westwood you mentioned and the case you worked for the Department of Justice?"

She leaned back in the booth and pushed her flyaway hair out of her face. "That case, Colby's case, the case doesn't make any difference," she said wryly. She was starting to suspect they might have more in common than first met the eye.

"What did they have you doing? I'm not looking for details," he added before she could protest. "Just some sort of explanation. Both you and Colby know something of what's happening and he isn't around to ask. That leaves you."

"That leaves me," she sighed. "What do you do when you the organization you swore to uphold isn't one you feel pride being a part of anymore?"

"That sounds ominous," he said darkly. "And it hardly tells me who Victor Westwood is." 

"I'd tell you if I could. It's covered in a zillion DOJ security clearance stamps."

He accepted the gentle rebuff and said, "Then I'd ask what else is out there you could turn to."

She didn't know of anything else she could turn to. That was another problem. "There isn't anything I can think of," she said honestly and they lapsed into silence and let the conversations around them build and fall.

"Do you think…" she said several minutes later as she took the straw out of the drink and chewed on the end. "Do you think Colby got involved with the Chinese because he lost his pride of country?"

"If he turned then Assistant Director Dolon wouldn't be so eager to release him."

"You think Colby did what he did because he's a triple agent?"

"Double, triple, quadruple. Colby's probably got just as many sides as Taylor Ashby. There's no way to know with the information we have," David replied.

Megan nodded.

"I wish I knew why he did what he did," David continued. "I can't find the logic in it. Spy or not, mole or not, he wasn't the type of friend to throw everything—throw us—away on a whim. He took the same oath that we did."

She'd spoken her oath as eagerly and earnestly as anyone could ten years ago. _I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter._ "So help me God," she said aloud.

It wasn't something she took lightly, but it also wasn't something she should throw away because things got tough. The world's mysterious ways better start making sense soon or she was likely to run headlong into the embrace of Larry's Buddhist friend at the monastery and never leave again.

"I just wonder what other oaths he took before this one."

"And who he swore them to," Megan added.

"And if any of them ever meant a damn to him."

"I don't know. Trying to resign and run away may have been a stupid knee jerk reaction," she took another taste of the sickly sweet tea. "Maybe all I need is a blue sky, sandy beach vacation."

"We _all_ need that vacation."

She twirled the ice cubes again—round and round and round—with the straw. "I hear Tahiti's nice."

"Hawaii's closer."

"Cabo San Lucas, then?"

"This conversation is probably as close as we're going to get to a white, sandy beach for the foreseeable future."

"How true," she smiled. "Think Claudia would look good in a two-piece?"

David laughed. "Good to know you were listening after all."

"I was listening and processing other stuff at the same time."

"Speaking of time… You wanna try her cell phone again, or should I?"

"I'll do it," Megan said and pulled out her cell phone and hit redial. It rang three times before the recorded voice came on the line and for the tenth time in the hour and said: "You've reached the voicemail box of Naomi Vaughn. I am currently unavailable. Please leave me a detailed message and I'll get back to you as soon as I can." She closed the phone and met David's eyes. "I'd hate to face Don's wrath, but this interview probably isn't a good idea."

"Especially if she can't be bothered to show up," David agreed.

"Odd that she wouldn't show up after badgering us nonstop for the past three days though…"

David made eye contact with Candy and summoned her over. Why is it that men can send a waitress scampering to a table with the smallest gesture?

"Friend not showing up?" Candy asked and balanced a tray of drinks and sandwiches on her palm. The reporter was hardly a friend; a necessary nuisance was closer to the truth.

"Doesn't look like it." Megan replied.

"Sure you don't want lunch? Our special is corned beef and Swiss on freshly baked rye bread today." She brought the platter, which did indeed have the special of the day prominently displayed, down onto the tabletop as a temptation.

"No thanks." Megan pulled a five out of her purse and handed it to Candy. "I've lost my appetite."

Candy shrugged and tucked the money away, thankfully in her apron rather than her bra. "Have a nice day then." She picked up the tray and walked to a nearby table.

"This has been a waste of time," Megan said getting up from the table.

"No, not completely. It got us out of Don's hair for a little while. Hopefully he's calmed down somewhat and won't be out for blood."

"He needs the vacation more than any of us."

"And he's the last one likely to put in for the time off to take it."

The tinkle of bells and Nelly Furtado's _I'm Like a Bird_ followed them out the door. "She's probably out following an even bigger story. You know reporters. They're always on the lookout for the next big scoop."

"Probably."

Megan stopped. "You don't sound so convinced."

"No reporter in her right mind would be able to live through the last week and not want to publish the crap out of it. She was too insistent and too pleased when we agreed to set up this interview."

"You can take over the task of calling her cell then."

"I plan on it. Or…"

"Or?"

They'd arrived at the car and David hesitated with his hand on the door handle to the front seat. "Don't you find Dolon's orders to muzzle her a bit suspicious coupled with the fact she didn't show?"

Megan climbed into the passenger seat and tried not to groan. He was right. "What if we give Don more time to cool down and swing by the LA Ledger's offices ourselves?"

"Sounds like a plan," David said digging in his pocket for the keys. The car roared to life and Megan leaned forward to plug the address for the LA Ledger into the GPS for directions.

-oOo-

"No, I haven't seen her yet today," Gregory Halloway, the Directing Editor of the LA Ledger, said and leaned back in his leather chair. The chair squeaked. Loudly. "Please," have a seat," he gestured to the vacant guest chairs.

Picture frames—and gaudy ones at that—displayed popular editions of the LA Ledger like peacocks along the walls of the office. Never being one for high fashion or tacky celebrity news Megan was sure the journalism lacked artistic merit; a quick sample of the headlines ("Fashion Week Props and Flops" and "Britney's Latest Bash") did little to dispel that opinion either.

"Thank you," Megan said politely as she sat herself and crossed her ankles. "When was the last time you spoke with her?"

"She called on the phone yesterday afternoon about two o'clock. Is she missing?"

"That's what we're trying determine," David said from her right.

"She'd better be missing because she didn't even bother to call in sick this morning," he muttered.

"Do you know where she was when she called?"

"Don't know. Wasn't with her at the time."

"Of course not," Megan dismissed. "Can you tell us how long she's been with the LA Ledger?"

"About two years. Can't say they've been a particularly good two years for her either."

"Oh?" Megan arched an eyebrow. "How so?"

"We haven't had the best working relationship to tell you the truth."

"Really?"

Megan didn't like the fact that the man was almost too eager to volunteer information about his absent employee. "She's been bored silly with the fact that the most heavy hitting story she's going to cover relates to cocktail dresses in the society section. That's what sells papers and that's what makes her paycheck. With her past she just didn't want to accept that that was all that was left for her."

"Her past?"

"You didn't know?"

Both FBI agents shook their heads.

"I assumed when you took her into private custody.… Well, it isn't like anyone is going to let her run wild with stories about government corruption, or government misdeeds again."

"Again?" That piqued Megan's interest. A quick glance at David showed he was just as interested.

"She tried to publish a piece three years ago," Halloway explained, "when she was with the Washington Post. It turned into quite the behind the scenes political scandal. Not a public one, of course, nothing was ever printed, but needless to say she's no longer with the Washington Post. No one with any sense is about to touch her. Her former editor made damn sure of that," Halloway chuckled to himself. "Which, come to think of it, doesn't say very much for me.

"After you people hauled her away for her own protection and then released her when the threat was over, she was hot to trot to get in a new story. Wouldn't give me all the details, but she assured me that it was going to be a big one dealing with 'her specialty'," he made quote marks in the air to emphasize his feelings. "She needs to bury her specialty. Whatever she comes up with—no matter how Pulitzer worthy—isn't going to be printed."

Wonderful! Megan exchanged a worried look with David. It seemed there was more to Ms. Fluffball than met the eye. Who knew she had these hidden depths?

"In fact," Halloway picked the thread up again, "I was about to meet her for coffee and try to convince myself not to fire her when you FBI types started poking around last week. I've got to say that her not showing up this morning may very well be the last straw. You know what I mean?" he asked them.

"I understand," David said sympathetically.

"I thought you might," Halloway sighed. "It's impossible to staff a reputable paper without having to put up with employees who push the boundaries of their responsibilities. It's always a balancing act trying to maintain reader interest and reporter initiative."

"I can see how that would be difficult," Megan agreed to keep him talking.

"Greg?" An administrative assistant poked her head in the door while Megan exchanged another look with David—this time a skeptical one. "Sorry to interrupt, but you wanted to know when Martin checked in."

"Yes, I did. Did he get the photo?"

"He said he had a winner," the assistant gave a big, toothy smile.

"Thank you Betsy," he turned away from his assistant to address them again. "Is there anything further?"

"No," Megan replied getting to her feet keeping her gaze on anything but the monstrosities lining the walls in gilded frames. "You've given us more than enough of your time from what must be a busy schedule."

"Yes, thank you for your time," David agreed.

"Anything to help law enforcement. I'm sure my assistant would be happy to see you out."

Betsy bobbed in curtsy agreement and led them through the maze like corridors of the LA Ledger from the editor's office to the front reception area. Seeing them off with a cheery wave Betsy disappeared.

"That was interesting," David said pressing the down button for the elevator to take them to the parking garage.

"Enlightening to say the least."

"I wish we'd had time to do more that just a cursory background check about Ms. Vaughn."

"Everything about this case has been too rushed," Megan lamented. It was true. She'd literally gone from the airport to the office, been ordered to in fact. She hadn't thought anything of it at the time, for work always came first in the Bureau, but now that Colby'd been released with head spinning speed… Would this whirlwind ever ebb?

"Regardless, it seems that Taylor Ashby chose his conduit well," David said picking his cell phone out of his pocket.

"You trying Naomi Vaughn's cell again?"

"No, Don. I figure we ought to drive out to her apartment. I don't like the feel of this," he said as they stepped into the elevator.

"Not at all." Megan agreed hit the G2 button so the elevator could descend to the parking lot. No, not one little bit.

-oOo-

"Did you find her?" Don asked when David and Megan arrived back at the FBI office with long, drawn faces and frowns.

Don had spent an uneasy two hours avoiding writing a recommendation for Granger before David had called informing him Naomi Vaughn had stood them up. Then he'd spent the preceding two hours avoiding the Assistant Director because of that phone call.

"No," David replied. "After we left the LA Ledger we went out to her house and it was all quiet and locked up as if it were a normal weekday. There wasn't anything suspicious," he exposited as Megan dropped into her chair like a dead weight. "Then we went around the block to speak with her next-door neighbors—apparently Ms. Vaughn tutors two of the neighbor girls in English. It's a standing appointment and according to their mother, Mary Wilkenson, she didn't show yesterday. No call. No note."

"So she's missed two appointments in less than twenty-four hours. What do you want me to do? Tell Dolon."

"We thought we'd do you the courtesy of telling you first," David said.

Don gave a tight smile. "Thanks."

"I don't really want to tell…" Megan trailed off and rubbed her eyes with the palms of her hands. Don wasn't sure he wanted to know what Megan had truly intended to say there. "Never mind," she continued. "Don't the two of you think this is fishy? She was in protective custody last week and as soon as the threat had passed she disappears."

"I find it fishy that Granger was released and she turned up missing," Don said darkly.

"You think he killed her?" David asked sharply, clearly not liking the tone in Don's voice. David's arms tensed and he balled his fingers into fists.

"I don't know what to think about _him_." Despite his best efforts he still spat the word. "We're not about to find out who he truly is anytime in the near future."

"And you never will unless you talk to him!"

"Guys, Colby wasn't released until this morning," Megan said defusing the tension. "She went missing sometime yesterday afternoon. He couldn't have been involved."

Don noticed that Dolon had walked out into the bullpen and was mingling and laughing with some of the other agents on the floor. Deliberately, Don turned his back on the man. God help him when the Assistant Director found the paperwork with Don's signature that had released Naomi Vaughn from protective custody. "So what do you want to take to Dolon?" he asked and pinched the bridge of his nose. Hard. "We've got to start a missing person case, but I'd like to be able to tell him more than the fact that she's missing."

"Let's see if we can dig out what cell phone service she uses. It has to be in our records. Then one of our techs—" David glanced at something past Don's shoulder—"or Charlie can get a reading on the GPS chip without too much trouble. If we don't find her then at the very least we'll know where the phone is."

"Charlie's working on something for the NSA." And Don had no intention of speaking to Charlie for the remainder of the week. If he had anything to say about it, his brother was going to stay far, far away from anything related to an investigation of the reporter. "He won't have the time."

"They why's he here?" Megan asked pointing behind Don.

"What?" Don whirled around just in time to watch Assistant Director Dolon hand Charlie a blue folder. He saw Charlie mouth the word 'Thanks' and his stomach flip-flopped. His brother was an _absolute_ idiot! Don watched as stony as a statue as Charlie made his way over to the three of them. Dolon waded in the path Charlie cut.

"Don," Charlie greeted him coolly, standing there as bold as brass. Charlie was the fox in the henhouse, stirring up trouble, stirring up grief.

"Hello Charlie," David said when it became clear Don wasn't about to, or able to, reply in kind.

"Charlie." Even Megan smiled fondly at his traitorous, two-timing brother. She gave Don a bewildered look

Finally Don found his voice. "What're you doing here?"

"I came to invite you to dinner. Dad would like to see you."

"Is that's all?" Don crossed his arms and gave his little brother his best I-know-you're-lying glare.

"I, uh, also called in a favor," he nodded to Dolon, who hovered a polite distance away, lingering, listening, passing judgment. "I'd like you to read this." Charlie held the folder between them like a peace offering.

Don felt his nostrils flare, but he accepted the file.

"Read it," Charlie said and turned away without another word. Don could only blink at his retreating form heading for the elevators.

"I'll come to collect it in one hour's time," the Assistant Director added pompously and then left them to return to his office.

"Everything alright between the two of you?" Megan asked

"Fine."

He didn't care if she believed him or not. Thankfully, she didn't push it.

"What is it?" David asked peering at the folder.

"I'm not sure," Don said as he opened the classified blue cover. He whistled when a photo of Granger decked out in an army uniform stared back at him. Don flipped the cover back to verify it was indeed a classified folder. "Looks like I spoke too soon."

-oOo-


	6. Chicken

**Notes: **This chapter uses some of the Charlie and Amita backstory found in my first two fics Daisy Irrationality and Greedy Rationality. Also, Colby's quote about crossing lines is taken directly from Two Daughters.

** Chapter VI: Chicken **

This approach wasn't working; it hadn't been working for several hours. And if Charlie were honest with himself, then he'd admit he hadn't been able to concentrate since he'd left Don with Colby's classified file earlier in the afternoon. Charlie hadn't expected flowers, candy, or even an apology, but the tightly controlled anger had been a surprise. Don's anger hadn't been directed at him like that since high school.

Pride goes before a fall and Don's had just taken a tremendous beating. Don deserved to know Colby's actions weren't his fault and if that meant Charlie had to stay in the dog house, then so be it.

They may have grown up, but they were still the same two boys: the jock and the genius, the gun-toter and the chalk-wielder, the protector and the protected. Charlie snorted. After thirty years, couldn't Don see that he had grown up?

He knew what he was doing. He did! Except…

Except his approach wasn't working; he glared up at his chalkboard. He was missing something, he knew it, and he had no idea what. He groaned and tossed his stick of chalk into the tray. His shoulder muscles were harder than rocks, his right hand was cramping from gripping the chalk for too long, and he had a crick in his neck from writing terms high up on the blackboard.

How do you distill someone's life into an absolute yes or an absolute no? Even if that person was a spy, was it possible for them to fully comprehend the consequences of all their actions? They couldn't. He could. He'd need a matrix to—he quashed the train of thought. He didn't have the time.

He sighed. A binary yes and no lacked the beauty of a number line, which could stretch to infinity and which could also be divided into another kind of infinity. Numbers could allow for ambiguity and for error margins. He held the lives of hundreds of people in his hands, thousands and millions if he counted the population of the United States. _He_ was the one protecting them.

And this…. This was brutal and he couldn't afford to fail, couldn't afford to condemn the wrong people.

Did Don ever feel nerves like this?

"Problem?" Markenson—his almost ever present babysitter—asked from his position on the couch.

"No," Charlie lied. "Just a crick in my neck." To prove his point Charlie brought his left hand up to massage his right shoulder. Rocks were softer than this. He turned from the blackboard to the laptop resting on the table.

Charlie had been up half the night before chasing (thrice damned) closing parentheses to build a Minimax model in Lisp to simulate the game of spy like the game of chess. It was a half-hacked model with none of the graceful code Amita would have written, but it ran. And it produced quick tangible results both Markenson and Westwood could understand. The particular scenario calculating right now played out a Chinese attack.

"Is the next run done yet?" Markenson asked leaning forward.

"No, not yet," Charlie said. "There's probably"—he checked his watch—"another five minutes of calculations left." He brought up the status screen and it confirmed that nineteen out of twenty steps were completed and the final one was nearly half done.

"Oh, alright," Markenson sagged back onto the couch.

Needing a break from his equations he paced around the computer. Maybe it would get the blood flowing again. "How long have you been with the NSA?" Charlie asked Markenson for something to talk about.

"Four years next January."

That was a surprise. Justin Markenson wasn't that young. This couldn't have been his first job. Sure his ginger hair was still mostly full, but it was starting to thin. He wouldn't have to worry about the Hair Club for Men for another five years probably, but he'd long since lost his college baby face. A choice Charlie was grateful he wouldn't have to make.

"What?" Markenson asked shifting in his chair at Charlie's scrutiny.

"Sorry," Charlie glanced down at the computer again to force himself to stop staring. Seventy percent. "I would have guessed longer. What did you do before? Military?"

"I worked for an international agency," he replied vaguely.

"Which one?"

"Do you care?"

"Not particularly. Just making conversation. Your boss is a real piece of work, you know that?"

"He's a bastard," Markenson agreed, "but he gets results. I'm good at what I do and I did a lot to get here, so I do what I'm told," he shrugged. And he'd been told to supervise Charlie's every move. The man must have been played over a hundred games of Solitaire and Aces Up and Clock in the past several hours. He'd finally won Clock and had pocketed the cards in victory fifteen minutes ago.

Charlie did several forward shoulder rolls trying to loosen the tightness in his shoulders. "You can't enjoy being bossed around so much. Does he ever let you have an opinion on something more important then where to eat lunch?"

"Occasionally I get to pick the dinner restaurants too," he said dryly.

Charlie smirked and reversed the roll of his shoulders. "How many of these men and women do you know?" Charlie asked briefly tilting his head to his lists on the blackboard across the room.

"Most of them."

"Personally?"

"Of course." The man was almost cavalier.

Charlie dropped his shoulders and sighed. He needed to talk to someone and seeing as how his usual sounding boards weren't available Markenson would have to be an acceptable substitute. "Then how can you feel so at ease deciding who should live and who will die?"

"It's a dangerous world, Professor. Those of us who fight in it know the ends justify the means." His eye narrowed. "Are you having second thoughts about your analysis?"

"No. I'm just—" The computer beeped saving him from having to elaborate on his answer. "It looks like the algorithm has completed the first China scenario," told Markenson.

"Who's where?" The NSA agent asked standing up and joining Charlie in front of the laptop. Markenson peered over Charlie's aching shoulder. He tried not to flinch at the invasion of his personal space. "Roybal's essential again?"

"Looks that way. Here, let me print out the full result set," Charlie suggested.

"Okay," Markenson said and obediently went to the printer. It immediately began to purr into life. Charlie scanned the lists of essential agents and expendable agents. He shivered; Colby was listed as expendable again. Keying up the second scenario Charlie fought the urge to cross his fingers when he hit the start button.

"Charlie? Are you out in the garage?" Amita called out from inside the house.

He made a quick glance at Markenson. "She come out here?"

"Fine with me."

"Yeah, come on back," he hollered.

"Hey," she greeted him. She would have said more, but she spotted Markenson and clammed up. She was dressed in jeans and a halter top, which concealed more than enough to be decent while hinting at all that wasn't. She looked good. Really, really good. He wished Markenson wasn't in the room so he could kiss her hello properly. Instead he settled for a brief peck on her cheek.

"Hey, yourself."

"Can I talk to you privately?" she asked.

"You guys stay here," Markenson said grabbing the last sheet from the printer and excusing himself. "I have to go check in with Westwood anyways. He'll want to get an update on the latest run." The man left the garage with his phone already plastered to his ear.

"Hi," Charlie said suddenly shy once they were alone with no interloper listening in.

"Millie sent me."

"Oh?"

"Grades are due two days from now," she reminded him.

Shit! There was no way he was going to be able to finish them in time. He'd barely had time for sleep the past couple of nights. Where was he going to find the time to flunk three students, pass dozens more, and award As to the brilliant ones? Well, it looked like he was going to have to make the time. He didn't need to face Millie's wrath, or give any more support to her assertion that his crime work took precedence over his teaching. This week it might be true, but there were extenuating circumstances. "I've got two days. That's plenty of time."

"Charlie, have you even restarted grading the finals?"

"I haven't—"

"Where are they?" she asked cutting him off.

"Over there." He pointed to four stacks of papers, which had been discarded on the air hockey table. "Why?"

"Because I'll grade them for you."

"You don't—"

"You don't have the time," she repeated changing the end of his protest. "And since the NSA _won't_ let me help you with the case, I _can_ help you with your grading. It's the least I can do."

His shoulders slumped now that the metaphorical weight of pounds of essays was lifted. "Thank you." He had enough to contend with without imagining Jeremy Durkin's heartbroken face when he saw his grade.

"I'll just grab them and get out of your way so you can work," Amita said walking to stack all the exams together. "Is your grade book here as well?"

"On the bottom," he replied.

She lifted a tattered stack and unearthed the book to verify it was indeed there.

"Can you stay?" he blurted out. "I mean…would you stay for dinner? I'm almost done with my work for this afternoon. Oh, you should be proud of me incidentally." Charlie waved at the humming computer.

"You hate writing in Common Lisp," she chuckled when she saw the interface.

"I know, but I did it. And," he returned to his plight, "since Dad all but ordered me to get Don to come tonight, I don't want to face a family dinner alone."

"You sure?" she asked leaving the papers on the air hockey table and returning to him. "If your father wants a quiet dinner with just the three of you, then I don't want to intrude." He didn't say anything further because she was getting to the point where she could read him like a book. Two seconds later comprehension dawned and her expression cleared. "You had a fight." The fact she could read him that well was probably both a blessing and a curse.

"That's putting it mildly."

"With Don?"

He nodded.

"About what?" she inquired.

"About all this," he gestured to the chalk covered blackboards, to the computer running his time intensive, costly program, and to the door Justin Markenson disappeared out of. "He wanted me to drop the assignment. We haven't fought like that in years. I know he's exhausted, but being around him right now is like dancing on eggshells. And…" He might as well get this off his chest. "And I hate to admit it, but he's probably right. I'm not too wild about the assignment myself, but now I can't take it back."

"Because you've put your ego on the line?"

"That and I signed a contract." He snorted. "But, yeah, ego's most of the reason. He wouldn't let me help him—still won't—so I did the next best thing."

"Sometimes," Amita said with a wry smile and a glace at his exams, "the best way to help is to just be there."

He rocked back on his heels. "You're right."

"It took me a while to realize that, but I'm happy I finally did."

It was humbling to see their situation paralleled with his and Don's. When the time came, he hoped he could bear it as charitably as she. "Did you…ummm…did you get the flowers?" he asked trying to keep the hope out of his voice.

"They arrived this morning. You always give me daisies."

"You don't like them?"

"I do," she soothed him. "They're lovely!"

To assure him of the truth she leaned in and kissed him: full and wet and wonderful. That relaxed his shoulders more than his self-massage. "I'm glad," he whispered against her lips.

When she eased back she wore a teasing, crooked smile. "I'm just wondering why you always choose daisies."

He cleared his throat to stall for time, but knew the longer he stalled the quicker he could dig himself into a hole he'd never climb out of quickly. "Because of that first night two years ago, that one disastrous, perfect night."

"What's that have to do with daises?" she asked not following.

"Before you finished your thesis," he said trying to keep the blush from heating his cheeks anymore than they already were. "I had a daisy," he explained. "You know the chant: 'She loves me. She loves me not?'" She was looking at him as if he'd grown a second head. "Anyways, that's why I always send daisies."

Here eyes were wounded soft. "That's something you doubt?"

"No," he said framing her face between his palms and focusing on her full lips. "No, not now. Not anymore." To prove it he bussed her mouth again. Lightly. Nimbly. Teasingly. "She loves me a little?" he asked.

"She loves you a lot," she countered and added a kiss of her own for good measure.

"Passionately?" he asked between kisses and slid his hands from her face to bury them in her silky hair. How he loved the feel of her hair. How he loved the feeling of her!

"Madly." She showed it too.

He broke the series of kisses when the backs of his legs stumbled into the couch. She pushed him wickedly and he sat, shocked and dazed. And hard. Poised above him the light behind her head caused an aura to glow around her. Then, without any shame she climbed into his lap and wiggled.

"Agent Markenson is going to come back any minute," he protested with words even while his body sold him out.

"Then we'd better be quick," she replied. She nibbled his neck and shifted her hips leaving no doubt as to what she wanted.

He wasn't in any position to—or about to—complain.

-oOo-

"Thanks for seeing me on such short notice," Don mentioned to Dr. Bradford as they headed into the psychiatrist's office.

"Don't worry about it. I had a cancellation at six, so contrary to what my secretary may have said, I was open. Come on in and let us get started." Dr. Bradford took his seat and Don sat in his usual leather chair. It was comfortable now, unlike the first few times.

"So," Dr. Bradford parted his hands, "How has the last week been for you?"

"Not so great."

"I didn't see anything in the news, but did anyone on your team get hurt in a firefight?" he asked.

"No, no one got shot." Don said scrubbing his face with his hands and then ran his fingers through the spikes of his hair above his forehead. It only it could have been that simple.

"Family problems then?"

Don laughed wryly. "You could say that." The jumbled events of the past few days seemed almost overwhelming, but piece by piece he brought Dr. Bradford up to speed on the Taylor Ashby bombing, Granger's duplicity (Dr. Bradford hardly turned a hair with the revelation of Granger's ties to Chinese Intelligence), and his argument with Charlie. "And now," he finished up, "my loyalty is being questioned by my superiors and I don't want to go home. So, all in all, it's been a hell of a week."

Dr. Bradford folded his hands in his lap and leaned forward. "Then I'm glad you came. Do you blame Colby for this?"

"I trusted him—despite my serious misgivings about Dwayne Carter from last October—and…and…"

"And he let you down?" Dr. Bradford finished for him.

Don sighed. "That's part of it."

"What's the other part?"

Don slouched and tilted his head back against the grey leather chair. "I don't know."

"Yes, you do."

He pulled in a deep breath. He wished he could deny it, but he couldn't. "I do," he confirmed. "I can't help but imagine what I'd have done if I were in his shoes."

"How so?"

"Granger's good, you know, good at interviewing, good at interrogation. I don't believe I've ever seen him lose it while he's been questioning a witness or suspect," Don said.

"And you have?"

"We all have. That's part of the job—part of the territory that comes with being an Agent."

"When was the last time you lost control?"

Don thought for a moment. "The case that sent me to you. The interrogation of Buck Winters during the Crystal Hoyle mess. Megan'd been kidnapped and we were all wanting to take it out on somebody. I'd roughed the kid up, closed the blinds, and walked out of the interrogation room as Edgerton went in. I would have done anything to get Megan returned safely to us. Granger caught me coming out. He asked if I was sure this was what I wanted to do. I blew him off. And he said—I can still remember the exact wording—he said he'd 'seen what happens when you cross certain lines. It can be really hard to find your way back.' He knew what was going on. He knew I was kiltering on the edge."

"That doesn't mean he's never lost it."

"Oh…I know, but I wonder…"

"Wonder?" Dr. Bradford prompted.

He let the moment stretch out before answering. "I keep wondering what I'd do if it were Dad or Charlie or Liz," Don whispered.

Don scrutinized the palm fronds blowing slightly in the breeze outside the window. They had built up a steady rocking motion; they'd reach one side and instead of snapping, the limber trunks would pull the trees' center of gravity back to the middle ground.

"Charlie shoved some information down my throat this afternoon. About Granger's past. Information I should have searched for and requested myself earlier this week. For nearly three weeks…" Don trailed off catching himself. "It's classified so I can't give you the details."

"There's no need to elaborate. I understand. Go on. You were worried about filling his shoes."

"I can't imagine what it must have been like to be ordered to do something that would force you to be unable to protect yourself, force you to become a pawn in a larger game. To be given no choice in the matter. To have to sell your soul and have the owners continue to pick at it. That takes…" What was the right word?

"Grace under fire?"

"Yeah," Don replied and then he snorted. "I've never thought of him as graceful before," he said and, still slouched in the chair, turned his head to Dr. Bradford. "Hardheaded, cocksure, fast and loose, yes. But not graceful. In an odd sort of way I admire him for living through a nightmare, but what were the circumstances when Granger did lose it? What was the situation? He was speaking from personal experience. And now I know he's been on both sides. Even when I was questioning him Friday—he was rattled, sure—but David was right, he never lost control. He had it and I didn't. He was able to pull himself from the edge and maintain discipline. That's gotta take strength, man."

"It sounds to me like you envy Colby Granger."

"No." Don moved to shift in the chair and he had to pry his bare forearm off the leather. "I told you a while ago that I was worried that Granger'd seen too much. He _has_ seen too much. He knows too much. He has done too much."

"More than you?"

That question cut him to the bone and he pulled in a deep breath. "Yes, more than me," Don admitted. "And I can't help but speculate about what I'd do if I were in his position. Would I have done anything different in the past few years? Would I have had anyone to turn to? Knowing he was held hostage for nineteen days, shouldn't make a difference to me."

"But it does?"

"Yes."

"Why?" Dr. Bradford never asked easy questions.

"Because it feels like I…." he trailed off and then in a very small voice Don asked, "Did I fail him?"

"Did you?"

"I…" The fronds outside rustled to center. "I hope not."

"You need to be asking that to Colby Granger, not me. He's the one who has your answers." Dr. Bradford replied.

"I've put my life and my team's life in his hands on a regular basis. You can't do this job and not. I'm the boss. I have one agent who's a spy, another who lost his best friend, and a third who wants to quit. What kind of a boss am I?"

"The fact that you're even asking the question says a lot," Dr. Bradford said and then allowed Don several minutes to stare out the window before their session ended.

-oOo-

He should eat. He knew he should.

"You all finished with that, Donnie?" his father asked about to reach for Don's half-eaten plate of grilled chicken and carrots.

"No, I'll finish it," he replied. Why was lifting up his fork one of the hardest things he'd done all day?

"You picked at your food all night. Should the chef be offended?" His father took his seat across the now empty table. He could hear Charlie and Amita laughing in the kitchen as they loaded the dishes into the dishwasher.

"It's good," Don said, sighed, and put the fork down on the plate. He and Charlie had been cordial if not warm during dinner and they'd let Amita and his father direct the conversation. Neither brother had apologized, but they'd reached an unsaid understanding: I won't mention it if you won't.

"Charlie's in the other room. You want to talk about it?" his father asked full of maddening compassion.

Don kept his gaze on the carrots, they were fresh and home garden grown. They should have tasted spectacular. "What did Charlie tell you?"

"Nothing."

"Then how did you know?"

"That's how I knew it was bad. You had a fight."

Don didn't bother to contradict the statement.

"And so you spent the last half an hour pushing your food around your plate like a toddler? You've had plenty of fights with your brother before. Is there more bothering you?"

"It's all tied together. I went to see Dr. Bradford after I got off work this evening."

"Oh?"

"It wasn't a good session," Don said and reached for the fork again. Food was preferable to spilling his guts.

"I'm sorry to hear it."

He chewed his tasteless meal while his father watched him like a hawk and Charlie and Amita began to horse around in the kitchen. How could they be so giddy while his world was falling apart? He needed sleep and lots of it.

"It's been suggested that I should talk with Granger."

"Who's suggested that?"

"David, Charlie, now Dr. Bradford. I'm sure I could scrounge up a few more names."

His father's expression told him he'd make a really quick fourth name. "And you don't want to?"

"I don't have anything to say to him!"

His father crossed his arms and leaned back in the chair. "It sounds like you've made your decision then."

"You're damn right, I have." Don used his fork to cut up a few more pieces of the chicken and shoved them into his mouth. He swallowed the mouthful of food and reached for his water glass to wash it down. "I interrogated him Friday night. I've read the Assistant Director's official statement. Charlie gave me his classified file. I told him this morning that he'd be transferred as soon as I could draw up the proper paper work. There isn't anything else to discuss." He slammed the glass as if to indicate his decision was final.

"I understand."

"Do you?" Finished with his dinner Don pushed the plate away. "Is the part where you tell me some cute, little metaphor and tell me everything is going to be alright? I'm a little old for fairytales."

"You're a little too old to be throwing temper tantrums too." His father hardly batted an eyelash; he leaned back in his chair and looked at Amita's empty place. It had been Mom's years before. "Over the years, I've learned not to argue with your mother when she was dead set on something. This house for instance."

Don stared at the drinking glass as if it were the Holy Grail.

"I didn't think we could afford it with an infant—you were hardly walking—my parents would now be on the far side of town, plus there were plenty of more practical places we could have chosen. However, she'd fallen in love with the place. She begged. We argued. The realtor moved heaven and earth to make a fair deal, your grandparents were so enthusiastic, my co-workers were very encouraging. She won."

Finally, Don looked up.

"Two years after the deed was signed, I lost my job with the firm I started with after college. Reorganization. The new salary I got at the City Planners Office wasn't nearly as much. I tried to convince her that we needed to sell the house. She wouldn't budge.

"I remember that." In his mind's eye he remembered creeping down the stairs after he'd been put to bed. He'd wanted a drink of water, but had gotten much more than that. "Mom said 'this was our home and you were a fool to not to realize it.'"

"I _was_ a fool not to realize it. She was right and it took me four years and a promotion before I could admit it. I'd been arguing all the logical points: money, security, practicality. From the standpoint of the brain, I may've been right, but contrary to Charlie's prostrations, logic isn't everything. It thrills me that Charlie bought the house. He fought for his home, when I tried to sell it. I was a fool again."

Don smiled. "You trying to tell me you can't argue with the heart?"

"Oh, you can argue with heart all you want, but when everyone you know is giving you the same advice you're a fool not to take it. Or you're a chicken." Alan stood up. "I didn't raise a fool, or a chicken."

Charlie stuck his head through the kitchen door. "You done with dinner, Don? Your plate's all that's left to go into the dishwasher."

Don stared at the remains of his meal. Was he a fool? He didn't need to trust Granger in order to hear his side of the story. He didn't need to change his mind; the man was still going to be shipped off to another Regional Office. He didn't have anything to lose by speaking with him.

"Yeah, he is," Alan said, piled the used silverware on top, and handed the plate to Charlie.

"I interrupt something?" Charlie asked taking the plate with one hand and pointing between Don and their father with the other.

"I'm done with it," Don said.

"Okay..." his younger brother said drawing the word out in a disbelieving tone. Don saw his father shake his head and Charlie changed the subject. "Amita's got the ice cream all dished out, do either of you want chocolate sauce?"

"Yes," his father said.

"One for chocolate. Don?"

He was now staring at the empty plate still in Charlie's hands as if it held all the answers he was seeking. Home is where the heart is. Granger's home sure as hell wasn't his apartment. His home was his work. He'd made that plain this afternoon by having the guts to show up at the office. What if his home was also…his friends?

"Don?" Charlie asked again.

"No thanks."

"One chocolate and one no chocolate, then. They'll be coming right up."

"Sounds good," Don said in a hollow voice.

Charlie pushed the door open with one shoulder and delivered the order to Amita. Instead of entering the kitchen he turned around. "I did interrupt something, didn't I?"

"Yes, but it's fine," Don admitted.

Charlie nodded and joined Amita in the kitchen.

Don turned to his father and grumbled, "I still say that was a cute, little metaphor."

His father raised his eyebrows in that smugly superior way that suggested his little boy made a good decision. "Did it work?"

"Perhaps."

"One chocolate?" Amita asked coming into the dining room with heaping bowls full of ice cream.

"Mine," said Alan.

"And than must mean you are the no chocolate," she said and scooted the second bowl in front of Don.

Amita licked the extra chocolate off her thumb and sat down in his mother's chair. She belonged there now. Charlie brought in two more bowls and doled out spoons to the four of them.

Fresh spoon in his hand he realized if he didn't go immediately, he'd lose his nerve. It would be too easy to let Granger slip away, tail tucked between his legs. What kind of a boss was he if he didn't at least ask what Granger's motivations were?

A poor one.

"There's something I need to do," he pushed himself away from the table and dug his car keys out of his pocket.

"You hardly touched the ice cream!" exclaimed Charlie.

"I have someone I need to talk to." He was going to have to talk with Gra—Colby. Colby. Don to Colby not Eppes to Granger. Even if all the conversation did was convince him he wasn't chicken it was something he had to do. He was sure his father was smirking.

He wasn't chicken!

-oOo-

Charlie's blackboard was covered with equations and numbers, lists and graphs, Greek symbols and mathematical symbols. Markenson had relaxed Westwood's absurd rule about constant supervision for the evening and it was nice to work without distraction since the house was quiet; Amita had left after dinner and his father had headed up to bed earlier than usual, which left Charlie alone with his work in the garage. The laptop beeped to announce the completion of Chinese Scenario Two and he spun, chalk still in his hand, from the blackboard to the computer.

The results blinking on the screen weren't any better than those of Scenario One. Frowning he printed out the detailed results set and set Scenario Three to run. It was the most complicated and would probably take all night to finish.

Retrieving the printouts he brought them over to the air hockey table and spread the detailed results out next to those of Scenario One. He pushed the test papers Amita had forgotten further into the corner to give himself more room. She'd no doubt get to her apartment, realize they were missing, and return to the house to collect them. Then he'd have the chance to convince her to stay the night.

There were similarities between the two runs: the most notable being that Colby ended up on the dead and expendable side both times. He transferred the chalk from his right hand to his left and picked up the red marking pen.

He circled a few anomalies for later review and stood back to look at the whole picture. It wasn't a pretty one. He felt it again…just like earlier. There was some variable missing.

He listed the major inputs in his head: the US, the Chinese, each individual agent, all the affiliated government agencies on both sides, the population as a whole.

Who gained the most in a US-Chinese war? Neither side would actively seek an open confrontation any more than the US and Russia had during the Cold War. Both sides had too much to lose especially when the status quo had served them so well for years.

He looked around the room for inspiration hoping something would spark a connection: dirty laundry piled in baskets on the washer, empty suitcases waiting for vacation, spider webs dangling from the rafters, splintery wooden support beams held the Craftsman house steady.

Nothing. Nothing. Nothing!

Outside the sprinklers hissed to life to water the yard.

Why did his visions only work when there were others in the room or he had someone to impress?

He clenched his fists and the piece of chalk split into two. Naturally, the smaller of the two pieces was left in his hand. He stooped to pick up the fallen piece from the floor when he heard the door to garage open behind him.

"Amita, it is good you're back. I was hoping—"

It wasn't Amita.

Charlie saw a rush of black fabric just before a violent shove forced him to the cement. His shoulder hit the floor hard and he cried out as white-hot pain shot into his fingers like fire. A brutal kick to the gut ended the cry and knocked the wind out of him. Charlie doubled up into a ball on his side. His assailant rolled him over onto his back and his head bounced off the floor.

Stars bloomed like novae in front of his eyes.

Dazed Charlie watched them dance on the ceiling. A masked man crouched over him blocking out the lights from the lamps above, but not the star-like pinpricks of light.

A hand covered his nose and mouth. When he tried to squirm away a firm voice ordered, "Stay still!"

He kicked, but hit only empty air. He spun on the ground and tried again and his shoe kicked the chalkboard. It rolled back on its wheels hitting the washer and dryer. The clang made his already sensitive ears ring. The hands on him slackened, but a second later gripped him even harder than before.

"Do _not_ move," the voice growled in his ear.

The man pinned him on his side and ground his bruised shoulder into the floor. The pain flared up again worse than before. He felt what could only be a gun pressed into the small of his back. He arched to try and get away from it, but the man kept it firm. The hand covering his mouth disappeared and the man shoved him onto his stomach. A knee replaced the gun and he couldn't get in a full breath.

He grunted when the man wrenched his injured his arm back and bound it to his good one. The pain increased tenfold, but he moaned and couldn't do anything else except endure it.

"Clear?" a second, deeper voice asked.

"I've got him."

And bound like a turkey there wasn't anything he could do about it. Trying to clear his mind he focused through the whirl of stars on what was in front of him. The laundry bin had fallen off the washer, darks mixed with lights on the ground. Dad was going to be pissed because he couldn't keep them separate. He blinked again and the stars dimmed.

He couldn't keep his NSA work separate from his FBI work? Why shouldn't that be reflected in the laundry?

The first voice cut into his thoughts, saying, "Move or speak and you die."

In too much pain to do either he didn't scream and didn't retaliate while he was manhandled into an awkward sitting position. That brought the stars back and the garage whirled around him. His stomach lurched; he was going be sick!

"Where's your father?"

He wasn't going to puke. He wasn't.

"Answer me!" the man demanded and shook him.

"He," Charlie swallowed down the rising bile, "he went," another swallow, "to bed."

A blindfold plunged him into darkness and the gag stuffed down his throat forced him to concentrate solely on breathing.

"Take him to the van," the second voice ordered. "I'll check upstairs."

Upstairs?

Oh! God! Dad! Oh God!

He choked trying to scream. The man hauled him to his feet and he swayed when his feet failed to hold him. He tried to find balance, but felt too dizzy. Charlie fought to keep conscious so he would eventually be able to tell Don something about them.

Anything about them.

They pushed him forward and Charlie stumbled. His left arm was throbbing now, the pain completely overwhelming the racing of his heart. Obviously annoyed with his slow speed the man picked him up.

He was useless, worthless, and there wasn't anything he could do.

Charlie strained to hear the fire of a gun upstairs, but it never came. The only sound he could hear from outside the garage was the hiss of the sprinklers and when the drops hit the grass they sounded like rain. He went limp and the feeble light though the blindfold wasn't enough to overtake the black. It wasn't Don's pride falling; it was his.

Then there was just the black and just the rain.

Black. Rain.

-oOo-


	7. The Way it Works

** Chapter VII: The Way it Works **

He could get up tomorrow morning, get in his car, and just drive, run away and leave everything behind. Colby thought it was a nice dream, but that was all it would be. Besides, how long could he live on the run?

A few days? A few weeks?

Westwood and Dolon would see to it he would be followed and chased, hunted and eliminated. They'd never let him escape into the sunset. It would all end with an out-of-control police chase and a spectacular, fiery crash. And while the gory shots of his charred body would be discreetly handled by the forensics team assigned to the scene, there'd be pictures of the resulting carnage in all the national papers. A disgraced FBI Agent running amok would make quite the story.

Colby twirled the chopsticks in his hand round and round and round. Pushing away his morbid thoughts he licked the last bit of sticky rice clinging to the end of one of the chopsticks. He cleaned up the remains of his Golden Dragon takeout dinner: soy sauce went into its slot on the 'fridge door, the empty take out cartons went into the trash bin, and the chopsticks and water glass went into the sink. Mess taken care of, he leaned on the counter at the lip of the sink and tried not to eye the cupboard directly above the refrigerator.

He could pack tomorrow and get drunk tonight.

Stalling, he released his appointment reminder—the one he'd canceled—from its magnet and tossed it in the trash with his dinner. He may be shrinking from responsibility by canceling, but today he didn't want to face the past or the future.

His eyes slid again to the cupboard of their own accord. Hard liquor wouldn't release him from his reassignment trap, but it would let him forget...for a little while. And tonight that's what he wanted. Giving in he hauled out a tumbler and his prized Johnnie Walker Blue.

He'd bought the blended scotch whiskey the night he was officially done with military service and had only sipped at it on special occasions. Tonight wasn't what he'd classify as special, but it sure wasn't a Budweiser night. Setting the tumbler on the kitchen counter he uncorked the bottle and inhaled deeply. The smooth, smoky scent filled his nostrils and he let the scent linger as he imagined what the rich amber liquid would taste like: burnt peat with a kick of bitter chocolate. Then his insides would glow with the warmth of fire.

Before he could pour out the doorbell rang.

He put the bottle down on the dining table and held still for a moment hoping he'd imagined it, but then it rang a second time and Colby couldn't let himself ignore it.

When Colby saw a distorted Don Eppes through the door's peephole he groaned. After their argument earlier Colby didn't particularly want to let the man in. What more could he want? If ever there was a time to let things go unsaid this was it.

"Eppes," Colby said opening the door, but making sure to block most of the opening with his body.

"Can I talk with you for a moment?" Don asked.

"If this is a continuation of our conversation at the office, than I'd prefer to skip it. I know where you stand. There isn't anything else to discuss."

Don took a deep breath. "There is."

"What?"

"May I come in?" Hands in his jacket pockets Don actually appeared subdued. He could still sense Don's anger simmering below the surface, but it wasn't as explosive as it'd been that morning. "Please."

"Mi casa es su casa," Colby said and backed out of the way. It had taken him all through dinner to get over the sick feeling that his possessions had been pawed over and examined within an inch of their life. "Especially since I heard you've already made a…" Colby fumbled for the correct word, "_thorough_ search of the place."

Don winced but didn't apologize and Colby closed the door. He watched Don get his bearings and scan the tiny kitchen and living room. "You drunk?" Don asked pointing to the open bottle of whiskey.

"Not yet."

"How much have you had?"

"None," Colby replied, but Don's look was still skeptical. "Do I need to do a Field Sobriety Nine Step Heel-Toe Test to prove it to you? I can also touch my nose." Obediently Colby tapped his nose twice. "You interrupted before I could get started."

"Sorry," Don said to his shoe tops. "We sit down?"

Colby shrugged and gestured to the threadbare loveseat. "Sure."

Don took his seat among the fraying pillows and Colby grabbed the chair he was sitting in earlier and dragged it three feet into the living room. He spun it around and straddled the chair backwards. "What'd you come for? I doubt it was to play cop on my liquor consumption."

Don thought for a moment and nodded as if he'd made up his mind. When he spoke it was slow and deliberate. "I came because I don't understand what happened."

Colby ran his fingers along the top of the rough chair edge. It had splintered and he picked at a broken wooden spike. "I lied to cover my ass. You arrested me. The event sequence is pretty clear."

"Why'd you lie to me in the first place?"

"You really want an answer to that?"

"I wouldn't be here otherwise. In your interrogation you told me exactly what I wanted to hear. Why?"

Even though this was approachable Don and not the pissed off version, Colby still wanted to pull back and hide his true intentions. He didn't want anything he said to be used against him later. "Because I was ordered to maintain my cover and keep any Janus List fallout to a minimum. No matter the cost."

"Even if the cost was the respect of your peers and country? Your friends?"

"No matter the cost," Colby repeated.

"This is honestly how you want to end things?"

"It's already over," Colby said through clenched teeth.

"I said honestly."

Colby turned away and examined the peeling sea-spray pale blue wallpaper near the window as if it held the clues to all the solutions in life.

"Fine." Out of the corner of his eye he saw Don throw his hands up in defeat. "Fine. If that's the way you want things to be, then that's the way they'll be."

"I want things to go back to the way they were before." The words had spilled out before he thought to censor them.

"They way they were was a lie," Don replied.

He swung back quickly. "No, Don, it wasn't."

"And you want me to blindly believe that?"

"You ask me to blindly believe things everyday," Colby retorted.

"That's different."

"How? How, Don? You have your orders. I had mine. I was ordered to keep quiet. It's part of the job of an intelligence operative. Are you more upset because I followed my orders, or because those orders came from above you?"

"And didn't you question those orders?" Don asked sitting down again.

"What?" That hit too close to home.

"Naomi Vaughn. She's missing again. Did you know that?"

He gulped. Was this all going to be for nothing? "I didn't."

"I don't believe that," Don growled. "I stopped you red-handed sneaking her out of the house."

"I told you, I told Dolon, I told Westwood," Colby made sure to enunciate each name perfectly as he stood up and returned the chair to the dinning table. "I was moving her out of the fire zone." He braced his arms on the table on either side of his whiskey. No matter how much he drank, it wasn't going to be enough to mask the pain tonight.

"And what did you intend to do once she was out, hummm? Turn around, Colby. Tell me what you were gonna do to her."

Colby didn't budge. "I don't want to discuss this."

He heard the creak of the sofa as Don rose. "Why can't you answer?" Don shot back hotly.

"Leave."

"No." Then Don closed in and was whispering in his ear. "Why didn't you kill her in the bathroom? That would have been the easiest thing to do. In the confusion you could've used one of the assassins' guns. You're good enough. You could've pulled it off. Blamed it on someone else." That was true and he wasn't proud of it. Colby gripped the smooth, glass whiskey bottle. "Did you have it all planned out? Were you going to shoot her on the beach? Or were you going to smuggle her away, hand her over to Black Rain, and then run for it? If we find her dead body tom—"

"If I wanted her dead, she'd be dead!" he shouted as he whirled around like lightning.

The whiskey went flying and sailed in an arc until it smashed into the far wall. Glass shards showered and the alcohol streaked the wallpaper like amber blood.

Colby's legs gave out and he sank to the carpet.

Don took a reflexive step back and Colby watched the emotions flit across his face: disbelief, incredulity, and then understanding. "You were ordered to kill her." It may have been word for word exactly what Charlie had stated two days before, but the tone and inflection made it different, made it hurt more, as Don loomed over him passing judgment.

"You believe me capable of cold blooded murder?" Colby asked. He couldn't bring himself to stand and be Don's equal. He was where he belonged.

"You know exactly how many people you've killed. Why should one more matter?"

"There comes a point in battle," Colby said to Don's shadow, "when you lose count. In war it's easy to be told the enemy's evil, that they deserve to die. It is you versus them. One of you isn't going to walk away and you do what's necessary to make sure it's not your blood in the desert sands. That's different from being told to kill someone, who's perfectly innocent, who's done nothing to you, who has no motive against you or your family. Naomi Vaughn was in the wrong place at the wrong time. She didn't do anything. She didn't know anything."

"But someone saw her as a threat," Don said crouching next to him.

Colby nodded.

"Who?"

"Don't make me answer that." It was another slip and he couldn't take it back, so before Don could respond he went on attack. "You want me to believe you suddenly care? That you had this radical change of heart in," Colby glanced at his watch and let the sarcasm drip from his words, "nine hours? I'll be gone soon enough. Content yourself with that."

Don sighed and put his hand on Colby's shoulder. It was a comforting weight, but Colby didn't want it to be. He shrugged his shoulder, but instead of throwing Don's hand off altogether Don slid it down Colby's arm. "Where're they reassigning you to?"

"Overseas."

It took five whole seconds for Don to match the word overseas with Beijing. Don furrowed his brow and cocked his head to the side. He honestly seemed to be concerned. "Colby, are you in over your head?"

He closed his eyes briefly. His answer to that could either damn him or save him and his heart started to hammer in his chest. He was already skating on thin ice…ice that could crack and give way in an instant, or with a wrongly placed word. "Why are you asking?"

"Because I've had,"—he gave a self-deprecating smirk—"four different people remind me that I haven't exactly been the best boss in the world to you."

"You came to put your conscience at ease." Colby scoffed.

"That's part of the reason," Don admitted, "but it's not all of it. Man to man, are you in trouble and need to get out?"

"How do I know you're not playing me?" Colby evaded answering the question.

"You could've come to me. You could've told me what was going on. I would've listened."

"No, you wouldn't've. You've always seen things as good or evil, black or white. Anything I would have told you would have smudged that line too much for your liking. You wouldn't allow me to talk with Dwayne privately. I didn't want things to get worse."

"Worse than this?"

"Oh, yes. Much worse. My actions aren't your responsibility, Don."

"You're on my team." Don squeezed his arm. "And when you're on a team you gotta trust all your team members. Like you said to me in the car two and a half weeks ago 'that's the way it works.'"

"There isn't anything you can do."

"You don't know that."

"It's a fight I can't win," Colby whispered.

"It's a fight you can't win _alone_."

"You don't know who we'd be up against," Colby said darkly. "You don't want to know."

Don let his hand slide off. "You don't want to tell me?"

"It's not—you're not involved in it as deeply as I am. If I tell you…. I've been doing this a long time, I'll be fine." Take my protection, Colby begged silently. Please. Colby had to look away from Don's damnably honest eyes, otherwise he'd spill everything and he didn't think he'd be able to live with the consequences. The whiskey on the wall would make a lovely stain.

"Expensive stuff?" Don asked following his gaze.

"Two hundred a bottle."

"Bet it would've been good," Don chuckled.

"Yeah."

Don's cell phone rang and he shifted to dig the phone out of his jeans pocket. Don sighed, but Colby was grateful for the interruption because it allowed him space to breathe. Their conversation had been too raw, the most honest one he'd had since coming to Los Angeles; Colby'd spent too many cases, too many sunrises building a wall around his emotions.

Don hadn't had the cell phone up to his ear for more than five seconds before he blanched. "Amita," he soothed her, "Amita, slow down. What about Charlie?"

Colby couldn't hear what Amita was saying exactly, but he could hear that her voice was high pitched and speaking a million miles a minute. Then Don's face hardened. "What'd you mean he's gone?" Don asked her and there was a lengthy pause as Amita explained. "I'll be there as soon as possible," Don told her. "No, don't call the police. I'll handle it. Yes, I'll hurry." With that he hung up and stood up.

"Charlie's missing?" Colby asked despite the fact Don's side of the conversation had already made that clear.

"That's what it sounds like." Don had on a brave front, but Colby could see the cracks. "Amita came back to the house to get something she forgot and found the garage in shambles. No sign of Charlie."

"You need to go?" he asked Don. He knew he wouldn't be welcome, knew this wasn't his fight, but still it hurt.

"I do." Don stood up and pocketed his phone. He took three steps to the door and hesitated. "Are you coming?"

"You want me?"

"Unless you don't want to."

Not waiting for a second invitation Colby rose to his feet and grabbed his jacket.

-oOo-

They hustled out to the parking lot and Colby watched when Don, full of nervous energy, groped with the automatic lock remote and dropped his car keys on the pavement. "Let me drive?" Colby asked.

After a moment's hesitation Don tossed him the keys to his Chevy Suburban. "It would probably be best."

Colby gave a tight smile and unlocked the driver's side. "Thanks." Colby adjusted the seat height and the mirrors while Don climbed in on the other side.

"You know the quickest way?" Don asked as he buckled his seat belt.

"Yep." Colby put his hand on the passenger head rest and looked back to check for other cars. There weren't any and he put the car in reverse and backed out of the visitor's parking space.

"Stupid question."

They stopped at four red lights on the way. Don swore at all but one, and would have at that one too except he was on the phone calling Megan and David to meet them at Charlie's house.

Colby pulled into the Craftsman's driveway next to Amita's Prius ten minutes later and Don was out of the car like a shot before Colby even had time to kill the engine.

Walking up to the porch Colby decided that being here again wasn't going to be easy, but it was possible. Colby bit his lip and he followed Don inside.

Alan only looked half surprised when Colby shut the door behind himself. Amita, on the other hand didn't notice him at all; she had her arms wrapped around her knees and kept rocking back and forth on the sofa.

"What happened?" Don asked.

"I can't believe this is happening," Alan said with very hollow eyes.

"It's okay. Just tell me what happened," Don said steering his father to the couch next to Amita.

"Shortly after I convinced you to go talk with—" Alan gave a sad smile to Colby. Even in such a horrible situation it warmed Colby's heart to see the grin. "Well… we broke up pretty quickly after dinner. Charlie was stewing over his work and Amita left. I went to bed early. I didn't… I didn't hear anyone come in the house, but there was a bit of a scuffle, but I just assumed—stupid of me—that Charlie'd gotten upset with his work. A few moments later someone climbed the stairs—I figured Charlie'd given up and went to bed. I drifted to sleep and the next thing I know Amita's pounding on my bedroom door."

"Amita?" Don prompted.

She was still rocking. "I was going to grade Charlie's exams, but I forgot to grab them before I left. So I went. I…I… It's all my fault. I should have stayed. The house was dark when I let myself back in. Charlie wasn't working in the garage and I didn't even bother to turn on the light. So, I went to find him in bed." If she was embarrassed about admitting she had no qualms about surprising Charlie in his bedroom at night she was too worried to care. "He wasn't in his room either."

"Did you try calling him?" Don asked.

"Yeah and when I called, I could hear the phone ringing from the garage," she said and uncurled her fist. Charlie's cell phone rested in the palm of her hand. "It was on the garage floor next to a fallen chalkboard. The room's a mess. Then I went to wake Mr. Eppes. We called you. I don't remember much after that. We've been waiting for you."

Don leaned over and took the phone. He flipped it open and muttered: "I should've returned your call, Chuck."

"He called you?" Alan asked.

"Not tonight. I meant over the weekend. It doesn't…." Don trailed off. If guilt could be etched on a man's face then there was no better example than Don Eppes, Colby thought to himself. He must have aged ten years in ten minutes. Don cleared his throat. "You want to have a look at the garage," he asked Colby.

"Sounds like as good of a place as any to start."

"Megan and David should be here shortly. Tell'm to come on back."

Alan nodded, but Amita didn't seem to acknowledge him. Without another word Colby let Don lead the way to the garage.

Colby wandered around the familiar room taking everything in. He normally dubbed it the _Math Garage_, but at the moment it more closely resembled a war zone than a place of higher mathematics. Laundry was strewn across the cement floor and one of the largest blackboards was also on the ground. All of the other six blackboards in the room were wiped clean. Paper printouts littered the floor, but the computer that was normally stationed on the table was gone.

"They took him here," Don said pointing to the floor in front of the fallen chalkboard.

"He fought," Colby added.

"For what good it did him," Don muttered. "Help me lift it?"

"Sure," Colby said and came over to help Don heave the chalkboard upright. When it was standing on its own he noticed that not only had it also been wiped clean like its brethren, it also had a jagged crack down the middle. Colby heard Don suck in a breath. Among erasers and the white crushed pieces of chalk there was a smudge of blood.

"Don?" Megan's worried voice carried into the garage.

"In here," Don hollered back.

Two seconds later Megan ran into the garage and stopped short when she saw the wreckage of the room. Colby tried not to shrug his shoulders defensively when she gave him a shocked look. She probably found his presence more shocking than the state of the room.

"We'll talk about it later," Don said to quell Megan's unvoiced question.

"Talk about what later?" David asked entering the room and jostling Megan to the left. "Alan and Amita said to go on back, so I let myse…" he trailed off once he saw Colby standing next to the chalkboard.

"Later," Don repeated and pulled the two newcomers off to the side to bring them up to speed.

To give himself something to do, and so he couldn't hear the angry hisses from Megan and David, Colby wandered over to the air hockey table. What must have been the ungraded CalSci tests were stacked in one corner, but the rest of the surface was covered with printouts. The equations, formulae, and expressions resembled hieroglyphics to him; it could have been in a foreign language as far as he was concerned. Someone, Charlie most likely, had circled several sections with red pen.

What in all of Charlie's work was worth kidnapping for…was worth killing for?

Colby shifted some of the papers aside and his own name caught his eye. Awww, shit! This was his work for the NSA. Black Rain's ops—he had no doubt over who the guilty party was—sure waited for just the right time to abduct Charlie. It was just luck of the draw that Amita came back for the forgotten tests, otherwise no one would have known he was gone until morning. He was surprised Black Rain had the guts and the gall. It was quite daring of them to extract Charlie while his own father was asleep upstairs.

Wait!

Alan was the type of father to bid his son goodnight. They had to have known Alan had gone to bed. Had to! Which meant….

He looked to the ceiling, but there was no smoke alarm. The light switch lacked a cover, so it wouldn't conceal anything. He peered along the underside of the air hockey table and there wasn't anything there. Next, he ran his hand along the underside of the sofa and lo and behold there was a small lump near the right corner's foot. He tugged and something small fell into his hands.

It was a bug.

He joined the group holding the bug between his thumb and forefinger for the rest to see. They looked from the bug to him and back again. No one said anything, but Colby didn't doubt for a moment what they were all thinking.

"I didn't plant it."

"I didn't ask if you did," replied Don. "Let me see it."

Colby handed it over and added, "It's identical to one of the bugs David and I uncovered from Taylor Ashby's apartment—one of the ones we were unable to identify."

"One _we_ were unable to identify?" Don asked raising an eyebrow. Don didn't add any more, but there was the unmistakable undercurrent that this was his second chance. 

He took it. "It's Black Rain's."

"You sure 'bout that?"

"Yes." Colby thrust his thumb over his shoulder at the hockey table and its debris. "They have the most to lose from Charlie's NSA work because it will mean the US will end outsourcing most of its intelligence gathering activities."

David wore a bewildered expression, but Megan shifted uncomfortably.

"How'd you know Charlie was working for the NSA?" Don queried.

"He told me."

"When?" Don asked sharply.

"Sunday afternoon while I was still in lockup. I figured he'd break down and admit to the visit afterwards. He didn't?"

"No." Holding the bug in the palm of his hand Don said, "I'll be right back. I'm going to grab a bag to put this in."

When Don left the garage the tension became tangible enough to swim in. Both Megan and David turned to him and their stares were unnerving. Finally David broke the silence, "I find it hard to believe Don called you."

"I was with him when Amita phoned."

"You just tagged along?"

"He came to me. I didn't seek this out."

"Yet here you are."

"Look! If you're still pissed at me, then why don't you come out and admit it!" Colby burst out.

"Yes, I'm pissed at you."

"David," Megan cautioned and put a hand on her arm.

He shook her off. "I'm not finished. He left you while Black Rain assassins were hailing you with bullets."

"Megan," Colby said as calmly as he could, "was able to take care of herself. Naomi Vaughn wasn't in any sort of position to."

"You were gonna kill the woman!"

Before Colby could reply, Don returned sans bagged bug and jumped in. "If he wanted her dead, then she'd be dead."

"And you expect me, us," he appealed to Don and gestured between himself and Megan, "to believe that. This morning you were ready to lock him away and misplace the key. He's a _spy_." The word came out as slimy, unclean.

"On Saturday you were practically begging me to speak with him, remember?" Don replied.

"This weekend we were still under the assumption he was a Chinese agent. Today's Tuesday and the Assistant Director's declared him the next golden boy. He's"—David pointed wildly at Colby—"a chameleon who can take on whatever shady camouflage suits him. We have no idea who he is, who he's reporting to, who he'll betray to suit the needs of his master's next plan. He's made his choice on who to trust and it isn't us."

"He did what he was ordered to do." Was Don actually defending him?

"Where's my point of view? Where's my voice? Ashby asked for you and Charlie, Don. Megan, you've been away on special assignment. Colby's been…" David groped for words. "Doing whatever double dealing duty he was ordered to do behind our back. And Me?" He thumped his chest. "I get to be the schmuck who just happened to be driving across the Sixth Street Bridge. That's my role? To be the message boy?"

"You're upset because you don't feel special?" Colby butted in unable to hold his tongue as they argued about him two feet away. "You wanna trade? You have no idea what I've been through."

"Nineteen days wasn't long enough," David shot back.

That was a verbal slap in the face and there was a horrible second when no one moved, no one breathed. Then after the initial moment of shock wore off Colby was furious. "How in the _hell_ do you know _that_?"

"Hey!" Megan stepped in between the two of them to try and break up the fight. Don turned away, bowed his head, and gripped the chalkboard's tray.

"Megan, don't act like you're the peacemaker. You don't want me here anymore than he does," Colby said with a sneer.

"You're damn right I don't!" David shouted and Megan's rejoinder was lost. "After the way you've played on our friendship over the past few days, you aren't even fit to wear a badge—"

"You held a gun to my head and would've _loved_ to pull the trigger!"

"—let alone be here."

"That's enough."

"Don't you dare judge me!" Colby took a dangerous step towards David.

"Who better than your friends? You lying, traitorous ba—"

"I said that's _enough_!" The three of them jumped at Don's command when he punctuated it by slamming his fist through the damaged chalkboard. Several chunks of the porcelain enamel hit the floor. Both he and David shut up.

Megan had tears brimming in her eyes and David's hands were clenched and ready to pull a punch. Colby felt like he'd been running for miles with full military gear.

Don, on the other hand, resembled the icy-cold, still surface of a lake. "Charlie's been kidnapped and the four of us arguing isn't going to find him. You wanna hash this out? Fine. Fine! You guys need me to be the boss and sit on your asses then I'll do that, but the longer I have to listen to you guys fight the more opportunity there is for Charlie to end up dead! And if he's already—" Don choked off the sentence unable to finish the morbid thought. "I'm not going to do this…. I'm not going to break down now," Don continued half under his breath."

All three of them looked away guilty as Don battled with himself to get control. Honestly, Colby was surprised he'd managed to hold it together this well this long.

"I'm going to have to take myself off the case for family reasons," Don continued once he'd gotten rein of his emotions, "and you three—yes, David, _all_ three because until Colby's transfer goes through he's still on the team—are the only ones I'd trust to safely bring him home. We're all running on precious few hours of sleep, but if we can't work through the Colby issue"—Colby bristled—"like adults then I swear to God…." Don trailed off no longer having the energy to continue. He collapsed wearily on the couch like an empty, withered balloon. "Can we at least agree to speak rationally?"

"Yes," said Megan.

"I agree," Colby said and blew out a breath. To give the others space he retreated to the air hockey table, and back to the others, tried to brace his hands on the edge. The adrenalin racing through his system didn't want to cooperate so easily.

"David?" Don prompted.

Colby couldn't see it, but he assumed David gave a sharp nod.

"Good," Don said darkly. "Colby, turn around again."

Colby winced and before he obeyed he snagged a puck from the side dispenser to occupy his jittery hands. "How'd you know I was held by the Chinese for nineteen days?" Colby asked the group quietly, almost whispersoft once he faced them. "I happen to know for a fact that, that information was sealed and classified. You shouldn't have had access to it." They may have been his accusers, but they also owed him answers, even if they were only out of fallen friendship.

David was impersonating a clam, Megan seemed to still be concentrating on blinking rapidly, and Don had tipped his head to gaze at the wooden beams above. He flipped the puck over and over and over waiting, but nobody had a ready answer.

"Well?"

"It was Charlie," Megan admitted.

"I know Charlie was granted access to my file, but he knows what top secret means."

Don, voice hoarse, spoke up. "I'm not sure what they had him working on, but Charlie appealed to the NSA and the NSA appealed to the FBI to grant us permission to see your personnel file. Assistant Director Dolon cleared it this afternoon. Charlie was trying to do me a misguided favor." Don's unexpected arrival at his apartment now made a sick amount of sense. "Nine hours is a lot of time for someone to have a change of heart," he said wryly, no longer searching the ceiling for diving meaning.

"How do you feel now that we know?" Megan asked, perceptive as always.

How did he _feel_? That was absurd. How did they expect him feel? To avoid them he looked down to his hands. The plastic puck had a jagged edge and he worried at it with his fingernail.

How _did_ he feel?

It felt like they'd stripped him naked. It felt like they'd flayed several layers of sunburned skin off his body with the intent to gorge his soul. It felt like he'd have to spend years with a single, flimsy thread stitching that gash together, but fractured halves cannot be sewn like whole. It was possible, however, for fractured bones to mend, for bleeding skin to heal, for vivid scars to fade. He could be stronger than before. He flipped the puck over once more feeling bones and muscles and tendons shift and flex in his now powerful hand. "I'd rather you didn't," he replied honestly, returning the puck to the table. "But that decision was long since taken from me."

"If it wasn't classified, would you have ever told me? Us. I mean told us." David corrected himself. His rage had been replaced with hurt.

His gut reaction was to say no, but he didn't think his best friend would have forgiven him. Hell, Colby didn't even know if he would forgive him for what had already transpired. "That mission wasn't exactly something I'm proud of. I wanted to bury it, bury it deep."

"Mission? I thought you were taken and tortured."

"Yes… and no," Colby replied. As you said so eloquently earlier, I'm a spy." The twist of his lips was bitter. "I was where I was supposed to be, doing what I was supposed to be doing. Whether it be in Afghanistan, in China, or in Los Angeles. We can go round and round on the subject but we'll get no closer to Charlie. Don, you said you didn't know what he was doing for the NSA? I'm pretty sure he's been analyzing the best way to rebuild the spy network if other countries get their hands on the Janus List." They blinked stupidly at change in topic. "Who to keep. Who to kill."

"The Assistant Director said list's a fake," Don said.

"He told me the same thing early Saturday morning, but I don't believe it."

"It's not," Megan interjected. "Don't ask how I know, but it's not."

"Early Saturday morning?" Don asked with knitted brows. "What time Saturday?"

That was what Don chose to latch on to? The time? Perhaps Don really was starting to unhinge. "Early."

"How early?"

"I don't know. Very. I didn't exactly have a watch or a window."

"Directly from the airport…. He lied."

"Who lied?" Colby asked confused.

"Dolon. Told me he came to the office directly from the airport. He lied!" Don slapped his palm against his thigh, and then flinched because it was the same hand he'd stuck through the chalkboard.

"I doubt it's the first time. You sure you want to know who we're really up against, Don?" Don, as well as Megan and David, looked at him with expressions of such innocence. Could they not see who they were investigating? Who'd been playing with them since this whole thing started?

"Am I involved deeply enough for you, Colby? Does Charlie have to be dead?" There was a naked, pleading look in Don's eyes.

"We're up against ourselves."

"No," David protested and scratched his bald head trying to deny it. "No, I refuse to…"

"They offered me a job," Megan said miserably and sunk on to the couch on Don's empty side.

"What?" Don may have vocalized the question but Colby had it too.

"The Assistant Director and Agent Westwood. He's the lead NSA Agent assigned to compiling information for counterintelligence," she explained to David. "I couldn't bring myself to tell you at lunch, I'm sorry."

"I understand," David replied. "That explains why you went pale as a ghost when I handed you the purported Janus List names."

She nodded. "Because I've been profiling, researching, and in some cases interviewing them for the past six weeks. All the Americans were there. Except for Carter. Except for Colby."

All three of his teammates looked at him.

"They're trying to break us up," Don said, pieces falling into place with sudden clarity. "Dolon nearly fired me Saturday. They're shipping Colby to Beijing. Megan, you they want to hire away to Washington." Colby noted he'd deliberately left Charlie out of the equation. His brother may not have been officially with the FBI, but that didn't mean he wasn't part of the team, or any less valuable.

"Seems like we keep with the theme of leaving me behind," David muttered, but without malice.

Don ignored the pity comment and charged ahead like a steamroller. "Don't you wonder why the one demand Ashby made—the one thing he insisted on—was to talk to us? Why us? Why Charlie? It was plain Black Rain wouldn't have been able to kidnap Charlie without inside help."

Please. Please let Don not be suggesting what Colby thought he was.

Nothing good came from walking this path. Didn't they know what Black Rain, what the NSA, what the FBI were capable of? They'd nearly destroyed his life; they wouldn't blink to destroy his friends either.

"Ashby knew Colby's name was on the List and that he worked closely with us. David, he knew you'd be crossing the bridge that morning, just like you do every morning. He planned to blow it sky high, rigging it took premeditation and more than a week's worth of time. He indirectly used Naomi Vaughn. Their relationship and emails started several weeks before he was poisoned with Thallium. He knew Charlie'd done work for the NSA and that he works with us on a regular basis.

"The man moved seamlessly in the intelligence community for decades," Don went on. "Megan, what if he also knew what your assignment for the DOJ was? What if the Department of Justice already had the names on his Janus List because he'd already given it to them! Wasn't it convenient you returned the very morning Ashby bombed the bridge? Wasn't it convenient that the extremely busy Assistant Director of the FBI—" Don stopped abruptly and his eyes got big.

Nothing!

"Why us? What if there was more Ashby wanted us to uncover?"

"Do you think…."

"What, Colby?"

"I'm not exactly comfortable suggesting this," he hedged. "What if," Colby licked his lips. "What if the Janus List's just the tip of the iceberg?"

There was a chill in the garage that had nothing to do with the weather or darkness outside.

"This isn't something to take lightly," Colby continued. "You three still have the ability to walk away safely. That's not a luxury I have. And I'm not going to drag you into the current with me if I can't help it."

"We're in this with you," Don tried to assure him.

Don was thinking clearly for the moment—all focus and pent up energy—his earlier logic was proof of that, but Colby could recognize the adrenaline for what it was. He'd crash eventually like a broken wave. None of them could prevent it. None of them could soften the blow. And when Don went down….

"You've made most of the jump, but you're not at the point of no return yet. First, we have Charlie's life to consider."

"We'll get him back safe," Don said too quickly. Out of the corner of his eyes Colby saw Megan flinch at Don's word choice. Don may be restricted from the case, but Colby knew Don couldn't give up command with the snap of his fingers.

"And then what?" Colby asked the hard question.

"Then what, what?"

"Are you willing to see this to the end? No matter the cost? Don, I can help try'n rescue Charlie. I can unearth Black Rain's dirty little secrets, but right now I'm not sure you—Megan and David, you too—understand the scale of what we could expose. It's a choice you're going to have to make on your own. Talk about it. Decide. I know I can't be here while you do."

With a noticeable glance over his shoulder Colby left them to discuss their fate.

"Bit of a disagreement?" Alan asked him as soon as he'd crossed the threshold into the living room.

Colby didn't know what to say to that, but finally settled for the obvious. "You heard?"

"It was hard not to," Alan paused and then added, "What family doesn't have its disagreements?"

"None that I know of."

"It was good of you to come."

"I was there when Don got the call and…" Colby shrugged to end the sentence.

"I see." There was a wealth of meaning in those two words. Alan Eppes saw more than most detectives and could profile someone as spot on as Megan could. "It's good to hear my son isn't a fool. I trust you aren't either."

"I hope not."

Alan clapped him on the shoulder, "You're not. I'm glad the two of you finally cleared the air, but will that be enough?"

"Sir?"

"I have two sons," Alan stated. "One's been kidnapped and I'm powerless to save him. That power should normally rest with my older son, but Don—"

"Don'll be restricted from the case."

"So that leaves my eldest just as powerless as me. Even as a child Don's never dealt with the loss of control well. I have two sons," he repeated as Megan and David stepped out of the garage. "Charlie's been taken from me—I can't change that—but Don's on the verge of falling apart, and maybe, just maybe you three can be a part of preventing that."

"He has us, Alan," Megan replied.

"And we will," David said and then directly looking at Colby added, "No matter the cost."

Colby accepted the silent apology and prayed he hadn't just condemned them all.

-oOo-


	8. Up Chuck

** Chapter VIII: Up Chuck **

Charlie felt a cold washcloth on his forehead and groaned.

"Shhh," the woman holding the cloth murmured. "You're safe."

He moaned again and managed to open his eyes a crack. He was small; it seemed that his bedroom was completely dark, but the dim hall light was on and he could make out shapes and shadows.

"Mom?"

His ears were ringing, his head pounded in time with each beat of his heart, and sharp pains shot from his left shoulder into his fingertips. Had he and Don been fighting in the backyard again? He couldn't remember. He reached over to try and stop the sparks from flying down from his left shoulder, but despite his efforts they kept tearing down his arm. He wiggled his fingers—at least they moved properly, if slowly.

His mother's hands tried to soothe him, but they felt strange. Something was wrong. If he could just remember….

He started to sit, but that caused more ringing and throbbing.

"No, stay there." Gentle hands pushed him back onto the mattress. "I don't think—"

"Somethin' 'portant," he slurred.

Don. It had to do with Don. Had to tell Don! If his head would stop pounding for two seconds then he could think long enough to remember. He _must_ have had a fight with Don. How else would he have gotten hurt? They'd been outside on the wet grass. It was a fight about birds, lists, and fists; scenarios, secrets, and scripts; daises, China, and rain. There was a brief lull when he expected his head to pound, but he felt his pulse stutter and in that moment between life and death everything—Janus and Ashby, Colby and Dwayne, Westwood and Markenson—flooded back to him. He struggled to sit up.

And then he threw up.

"Shit!"

"'om?"

"I'm sorry," the woman said apologetically. "My name's Naomi." She twisted the bedside lamp on and he blinked at the harsh light until she angled the shade so the light hit the far wall. This wasn't his childhood room at all.

It was a cell.

Charlie wiped his mouth on his sleeve and waited for his vision to clear a little bit in the now over bright room. There were two Naomis splitting and coalescing before him. He knew that name. Naomi…. Naomi… "Naomi Vaughn?" he asked the clearer one on the right hand side.

"Yes," she unfolded the cloth in her hands which he recognized as a tattered pillowcase from the bed he was sprawled upon. She stared at the cloth as if trying to decide whether or not she should use it to clean up the mess on her shirt, the mess on the bed, or the mess on the floor.

His stomach lurched a second time, but he managed not to puke. "Reporter?"

"If you could call the rag I work for a reporting job," she groused, easing him onto the bed. This time he didn't argue or protest. "And you are?"

"Eppes. Charlie Eppes." James Bond he was not. He'd make a miserable spy. See what playing spy had gotten him: a busted shoulder, split vision, and a spilt dinner. "Where're we?"

"I don't know," she said brushing some chicken chunk remains off of her blouse. "Are you going to throw up again?"

He hoped not. "No. No, I don't think so." His nose twitched as he inhaled the sharp scent of stomach acid.

"Good," she said and glanced around the room looking for something more to use to wipe up his vomit. It was a very small windowless room—smaller than a CalSci dorm room—and the only pieces of furniture were the bed he was lying on and the small table next to it.

There were two doors. The open one lead to a dimly lit bathroom and he could see the sink and toilet. The other was shut and doubtlessly bolted.

"How'd I get here?"

"They, the same men who nabbed me, brought you in about fifteen minutes ago and dumped you here. I was worried you weren't going to wake."

He wished he hadn't.

She refolded the cloth to put a clean section on top and handed it to him. Grateful, he wiped his mouth. "I'll get you some water and a towel, just a sec."

He nodded. That was a mistake.

He sagged boneless on the bed and closed his eyes, so he could hide from reality. If he couldn't see it, it wasn't real. There was something to be said for the wisdom of the ostrich.

"Hey, I don't want you passing out on me again," she scolded and he felt the weight of the bed shift as she sat on its edge. "Open 'em!"

He pried his eyes open and saw she held a paper cup full of water out in front of him.

"Up you get," she said and when he'd propped himself up with his good arm she tipped the cup to his lips. He swished the water around in his mouth, but there wasn't anywhere convenient to spit it out, so he swallowed. He grimaced at the taste, but took another sip.

"I don't suppose there's a toothbrush and toothpaste in there?" he asked weakly.

"Sorry, fresh out. The maids haven't come to clean yet," she joked. Then her smile faded and the line of her jaw turned hard. "We're lucky to have fresh water, quite frankly."

He gave the empty paper cup back to her and let himself sink onto the bed's mattress when the room started to spin a bit too much for his liking. There were several broken springs and the bed had a distinguishable droop in the center.

Naomi had found a towel in the bathroom and she started to mop up his vomit on the floor.

"I'm sorry," he said. He hated how feeble and fragile his voice sounded.

"Don't be. Stay there. I'm bettin' that they gave you quite the concussion when they knocked you out. You must have given them quite the struggle."

"Not like it mattered."

She made several trips from the floor to the sink and when she was done she left the towel and the pillowcase in the bathroom. It still stank in the room, but there wasn't much she could do to fix that problem.

"Look at me," she leaned over him to peer into his eyes. "Your stomach will settle in a bit," she said looking at him critically.

"Promise?"

She smiled. He noticed that she had a pleasantly crooked smile. "The time I had my concussion it was nasty, but it passed." He noted that she neglected to mention how long it took to pass. "However, I'm sure you were out longer than I was." She held three fingers several inches from his nose and he focused on them. "How many?"

"Three."

"Good," she said and dropped her hand into her lap.

"But there were two of you earlier."

She frowned. "Can you follow my finger?" She'd brought her hand up again and moved it to the left. He tracked it as she slowly moved it to the right.

"You have no trouble following movement, but your left eye is much more dilated than the other."

"That's not good is it?"

"Not great, but not horrible. You must have been unconscious for quite sometime."

"In the van…" He'd woken up in the van. He could remember the rush of the freeway traffic. "Then they gave me something."

"Hummm," she said and tapped the finger she'd been waving between them on her lips several times, "that's probably not helping with the nausea. Still, I want you awake and talking. You said your last name was Eppes?"

"Yeah." Resigned he settled himself on the lumpy pillow as best he could.

"Are you related to Don Eppes, by any chance?" She was absolutely a reporter, a reporter who was living something that would probably become one hell of a story.

"He's my brother."

"Brother?" He could tell her mind was going a million miles a minute. "Why'd they kidnap you?"

"Black Rain probably saw my NSA work as a threat."

"_You're_ an NSA agent?"

"I'm a mathematician. I consult for the NSA and the FBI. Why do people always find that so strange? Crime and math make a natural fit." She continued to look at him funny so he added, "They may have hit my head, but I'm not delusional."

"What does a mathematician do to fight terror?"

"I was the one who uncovered the names in Taylor Ashby's Janus List."

"Ahhh... Then you're the one I owe for saving my life before that big, blond beefcake could shoot me. I bet he's the one who arranged for our stay at this lovely establishment."

"This isn't Colby's fault."

"You know the man?" She narrowed her eyes at him. "Of course you know him. When your brother took him into custody, it sure looked like he was at fault."

"He wouldn't have shot you."

"And your math told you that?"

The names on the expendable list flashed through Charlie's mind. "Not in so many words, but yes. I know him. I also spoke with him on Sunday afternoon. Colby's a good man. He's trapped just as much as we are."

"It's us trapped in this room not him."

He wanted to argue, but nothing she'd said was false. Colby wasn't here.

"I should've turned that crazy old man away two months ago," she muttered. "The events of the past few days make civil wars and refugee camps look like a cake walk. I never even saw the names on his damn list and it still managed to get me in this hell hole. And you? A mathematician is hardly what I can call threatening."

"Thanks," he said dryly.

"However, they must've seen you as a threat too or you wouldn't be here with me."

"Maybe," he started and pushed a few stray curls of hair out of his eyes. When he pulled his fingers back from his temple they were stained a deep, dark red.

"Damn," she swore. "I thought I'd gotten it to stop bleeding." She retreated to the bathroom and came back with a wad of toilet tissue. "So, you think this Black Rain organization thought I had the names and then they found out you'd seen them?" She dabbed the tissue tenderly at his hair line. "That's why we're here?"

"No," he said fear repooling in the pit of his stomach. "We're bait."

He fought, but it wasn't enough. Don held the gun; he held the chalk. This wasn't even remotely close to the safety of his equations and programs. His stomach heaved and he bolted upright.

"You gonna be sick again?" she asked.

He nodded because it probably wouldn't be wise to speak. They scrambled to the bathroom and he managed to kneel on the floor in front of the porcelain basin before it was too late. In between sobbing breaths—while Naomi held his hair back—he prayed for his mother.

-oOo-

Megan hung up the phone with a frown, reached into her desk drawer, and pulled out a hair tie. She stuck it between her teeth while she finger combed and gathered her hair into a serviceable ponytail. Once her hair was bound it was a relief to have it out of the way. A small relief, true, but with another sleepless night behind her and daybreak spilling sunlight into the eastern sky, she wasn't going to expect any more.

About to close the drawer she spotted her resignation letter. She pulled it out, unfolded it, and reread it. The words felt more real now than they had when she'd written them, especially after the team's unprofessional argument and disturbing revelation in the garage.

Nonetheless she was glad Don had stopped her since she couldn't help him—or Charlie—if she was on the outside looking in. She ripped the letter in two pieces and unceremoniously dumped it into the trash.

Now was not the time to make life altering decisions. She needed to stay for Don's sake.

As near as they could tell, Charlie had been taken shortly after nine o'clock. After she, David, and Colby had left the house the night had been insanely busy: they'd set a trap line on the Eppes' family phone in the—unlikely in Megan's opinion—event that the kidnappers would call; they'd called in a forensics team—despite Colby's assessment of Black Rain's espionage skills—to scour the house, the garage, and Charlie's bedroom; they'd posted guards—overruling Don's objections—at Charlie's house; they'd processed the necessary paperwork—after David's realization that the disappearances must be connected—to search Naomi Vaughn's residence.

As midnight melted into three in the morning they'd quietly begun to gather data about all of Black Rain's official operations, contracts, employees, and governmental ties. Megan knew they would need to tread carefully on any investigation of Black Rain's clandestine activities, but before they could get to that they needed more basic facts.

It was now approaching seven in the morning and they'd entered the lull before data started pouring in for analysis.

"Coffee?" Colby asked dangling a Styrofoam cup in front of her.

"Thanks," she said absentmindedly and accepted the drink, a caffeine boost would be most welcome.

Megan took a sip and that sip confirmed that Colby had brewed the muck himself. It was triple strength, it was bitter, and it was awful. However, all in all, it suited the atmosphere and her mood perfectly. In an odd way it was nice to know Colby's chronic habit of making horrible coffee hadn't changed even though so much of him had metamorphosed in the past week.

Colby had a cup as well and he was stirring the copious amounts of sugar he need to make the brew palatable to his warped taste buds. He kept stirring longer than was strictly necessary before he spoke. "There's probably going to be a few hours sometime in the near future where I'll be unavailable."

"That's a bit vague."

"It's meant to be."

She could rationalize the fact he was shielding her, but she didn't have to like it. "You protecting me?"

"Until the day I die," he said softly.

There was power leashed in his quiet words and she blinked in surprise. He even paused mid stir, startled by his own admission, and his expression revealed that he did indeed feel guilty for abandoning her during the firefight.

"I sincerely hope that won't be necessary," she said after a long moment.

"You'n me both."

"Ummm," she rubbed her neck uncomfortable with both the intensity of his words as well as the reality of it happening. "What else can you tell me about these hours you're going to be unavailable?"

He resumed to whisking the straw in the coffee. "Anything except the name of the person I'm going to meet, the time we're going to meet, the place we're going to meet at, the reason for the meeting, or the matter we're going to discuss."

"And that leaves?"

"Pretty much what you already know."

"If we're going to successfully do what you suggested in the garage, then you're going to have to tell us more."

"Eventually, but it won't be here. And it won't be today. David check in yet?" he asked closing the subject and tapping the tiny straw on the edge of the cup. A coffee teardrop dangled from the end of the straw and he wiped it away on the cup's brim.

"No."

"Don called though. He's on his way in."

Colby made a face and chewed on the straw. "You're gonna have to send him away."

"I know, and I'm not looking forward to it," she took another drink of the sludge. "He does need to check in with the Assistant Director and he asked me to attend the meeting with him."

"That's probably smart." Colby said and continued to eat the straw instead of drinking the coffee. The man's oral fixation was obviously a delaying tactic.

"What?"

"Watch what you guys say."

"That goes without saying."

"It still needed to be said. Look, Dolon's been born and bred as a counterintelligence and counterterrorism expert. He _may_"—the way Colby stressed the word indicated that there wasn't any doubt about it—"have deep ties with Black Rain and if Don starts to shoot his mouth off, then we're screwed, so you're going to have to rein him in."

"Never thought I'd be policing my superior."

"Never thought I'd be telling you to," he said and the straw bobbed with his words. "Use any trick you need, but get him in and then get him out. The quicker the better."

She sighed and was grateful she didn't have wisps of hair in her face anymore. "Got it."

Colby took the mangled straw out of his mouth, gave a resigned smile. "You also know he's going to try'n take charge of the investigation when he gets here. He's been a leader so long he doesn't know anything else."

"And I'm going to be the one to snatch it away."

"Better you than Dolon."

"Cold logic comes easy to you."

"Logic can't be warm, but it can't exactly be cold either. It is what it is and we've all got to do what we've got to do."

Megan took survey of Granger from head to toe. He was a study in contradictions: tired steel grey eyes, a wise boyish grin, and a relaxed ever-alert stance. Compassion wrapped in a friend; danger packaged in lethal form. Whoever Colby Granger might be it was clear he had focus. "You're a man on a mission," she said.

"One fucked up mission." Colby snorted and stooped to toss his straw into the trash.

Instead of straightening up immediately he put his coffee cup on Megan's desk and picked something else from the trash—her tattered resignation letter. Although it was torn in two he'd clearly figured out the gist of its contents.

"Put it back. There's a reason it's in the trash," she told him.

He hesitated, but obeyed. "I assume there's also a reason you wrote it," he asked straightening up.

She toyed with her Styrofoam cup instead of answering. There were many, many reasons why she'd written it and most of them were still valid: her disillusionment with her superiors, the fact she'd seen how easily the Constitution could be twisted to obtain information about its citizens, the means and methods that could be employed to conjure even more intelligence. Then she'd come back to safety only to be thrown for a loop with Colby's alleged betrayal.

However, Charlie's disappearance trumped it all.

She wasn't a quitter, and if she went out, then she would go out with a bang instead of a whimper. For the past day (and night) she'd been simmering over the knowledge that Westwood has used her for his own ends. If that pig contributed to harming a single curly hair on Charlie's head then she was going to see to it he paid for it.

"Megan?"

She rummaged through the piles of paper on her desk and unearthed the Janus List. Without a word she handed it to him.

He scanned the list and she saw his eyes catch on what must have been his own name near the top, but he forced himself to read on to the bottom. "This is why you asked me about Owen Roybal?"

"He has an extensive military background. If you were going to have contact with anyone on this, I assumed it would be him."

He returned the list to her and grabbed his coffee. "That doesn't explain why you wrote a resignation letter in the first place and why it's now lying in the trash bin."

"I threw it away because I can't help Charlie if I run away," she replied deliberately leaving out an answer to the first half of his comment.

"Run away, humm?" Then he chuckled as if remembering something. "This evening—I mean yesterday evening," he corrected himself and took a too casual swallow of his beverage, "I had a brilliant plan to get smash drunk."

"What stopped you?" she asked wondering where this was going.

"A friend showed up at my apartment."

"Oh?"

"At first I wouldn't answer his questions either. When Charlie's safe we're still going to have to face our problems. If we weren't working," he continued, "I'd take you out for a drink, but since it's so early in the morning I figured I'd bring you coffee instead."

Colby gave her a pat on the shoulder and seated himself at his desk. He busied himself with sorting through various leads and files on the computer.

She took another sip of her coffee and she realized that despite its taste, or perhaps because of it, she savored it. It was the little moments and the small gestures others gave her that mattered. Larry's need to find the time to stop and smell the flowers no longer seemed quite so idiosyncratic. Colby's dual nature even carried to his actions. He may have come with advice about Don, but he must have also noticed her dark mood. He was farther along the road than she.

When had the man become wise?

"Colby?"

"Yes," he said without turning around.

"Thank you again for the coffee."

"Anytime." He still didn't look up from his reading, but the warmth in his voice was unmistakable. They worked side-by-side in companionable quiet for the next ten minutes. He was right. She'd still have to face her emotions after this storm had passed, but it was always darkest just before—

"Don," Colby said greeting their boss.

Megan swiveled around and said, "Morning."

Don tossed his jacket over his chair just like he usually did every morning. "What've you found?" he asked briskly, crossing his arms and waiting for their report.

"We've got preliminary reports from both the garage and Naomi Vaughn's place," Megan replied, slipping into the comfortable reporting role like a glove. "There's nothing conclusive yet because it is too early, but there are some promising leads—"

"You guys should be focusing more on the Black Rain angle," he said keeping his voice low.

Colby glanced over his shoulder to verify no one was lingering nearby to overhear. "We are, but that's something we're going to do carefully," he said.

"Tell me you've at least started."

"David's working on it," Megan assured him. "He went to retrieve the employee list and run some background checks. I expect he'll return soon."

"Good. What else?"

To stall for time she shuffled several sheets of paper on her desktop. Once she found the sheet of paper she wanted she handed it to Don. "Here's the shift rotation for the agents posted to guard the house."

He didn't bother to read it. "Come on, you gotta give me more than that."

Megan swallowed, but knew there wasn't anything more she should give him. She looked to Colby hoping for help.

"We made sure to choose people who have, at the very least, a passing acquaintance with Charlie," Colby added.

"You're both gonna stonewall me?"

"You know we're not. You know how these things work. At this early point there isn't much more that's definite we can give you," Megan said.

Abashed, Don folded the list in half and creased the fold with his fingernails. "It's a bit different being on the other side," he admitted. "You wouldn't believe the all-consuming need to have answers."

"I understand that you feel powerless, but I promise you we'll tell you as soon as we find anything relevant." That was the standard protocol answer. She'd given it hundreds of times before, but it had never left such a bad taste—ashes and acid—in her mouth before. She finished the last of her coffee off in an attempt to mask the imaginary flavor.

It helped very little.

Colby jerked his chin and Megan turned around to see David charging down the hallway like he had attack dogs on his heels.

"I hit the jackpot," David said slightly out of breath when he arrived. He stood on the opposite side of the half wall of glass and handed Megan a fax with LAPD letterhead.

"What is it?"

"There was an apparent suicide at the Westin Bonaventure hotel last night," David reported. "Room service tried to deliver an early morning breakfast and discovered the body."

"Sounds like more of an LAPD matter. Why'd you bring it up?" Megan asked.

"Because the dead man worked for Black Rain less than five years ago and for the last few years he's been a special assistant to Victor Westwood."

"Markenson?" Don asked.

"Justin Markenson," David confirmed and brandished a NSA file.

"What's the supposed cause of death?" Don asked.

"Overdose."

"They sure it's him?" Colby asked, ever the skeptic.

"It's his room," David replied.

"I'd feel better after we get an official ID."

"Then we'll get it," David bristled. Colby and David had danced around each other all night, always proper, always respectful, but never forgetful. It seemed like she was going to have to force the issue. "I got this hot off the presses of departmental exchange. The forensics team is about to head to the scene to start documentation."

Megan put her hands on her hips. "If they're under the impression this is a routine suicide."

"Exactly," David smiled. "I want to go myself."

"I agree, we've got to check this out immediately," Don said, taking charge. "Megan, you should go with David to the scene."

Megan saw Colby purse his lips, but he didn't speak. She was responsible for contradicting Don; if she was going to lead, then she'd better start. She took a deep, settling breath. "Colby and David will go out to the scene," Megan corrected. Colby's expression flickered with irritation, but he did start gathering his jacket and keys. David stiffened, but couldn't come up with an obvious objection. Don just glowered. "You and I have an appointment with the Assistant Director, remember?" she reminded Don gently, purposefully ignoring the sticky friendship issues her orders had also brought up.

"This is more important," Don protested. "You don't need to be there."

"Megan," David interrupted, "are you su—"

"Yes, David, I'm sure," Megan told him firmly. "Gentlemen," she said turning from David to Colby. "I believe you have an assignment."

Both men acknowledged the order and departed, but Megan couldn't help but notice the large gap of space that gulfed between them.

"How wise was it to send them out together?" Don asked her once David and Colby were gone.

"They're going to need time to talk."

"You and I both know their friendship will never quite be the same again."

"Either they work it out, or they don't; we can't baby sit them forever. Besides it's _my_ call."

"Yeah." Don grimaced and his forehead wrinkled. "Old habits die hard," he explained.

"Apology accepted," she replied. That was closer to a concession than she expected. "Are you ready for this meeting?"

He opened his mouth quickly to respond, but no words came out. "Not as ready as I thought I was."

"I'm not going to let you do anything stupid," she assured him.

"How are you going to stop me?"

"Let me worry about that." Honestly, she wasn't sure herself, but telling that to Don would probably be detrimental. "You have enough on your plate."

"Is he here?" Don jerked his thumb towards the hallway of executive offices.

"Got in a half an hour ago." She and Colby had watched the Assistant Director stroll arrogantly from the elevators to his office. Megan stood and stuffed her arms into yesterday's wrinkled suit jacket.

Don didn't say anything as they walked down the hall. Megan made sure to keep a half a step behind him in order to offer him the dignity of leading a little longer. It was another small gesture, but one she offered him without hesitation.

"Just stick to the facts and keep your temper," she cautioned him right before they arrived.

"Easier said than done."

"Let's get Charlie home first. That's the first task. Then we can worry about… other matters."

"I can't stop thinking of him," he muttered and knocked.

Dolon absentmindedly glanced up from his paper-strewn desk. "Agent Eppes. Agent Reeves. What's this flack I hear about Naomi Vaughn being missing?"

"It's not flack, sir, it's fact," Don replied, completely unabashed that he'd yet to report about her disappearance.

"Why didn't you bring this to my attention yesterday?" He may have asked Don, but the Assistant Director shifted his gaze to Megan at the end of the sentence.

Megan bit her tongue and let Don answer. "Yesterday we were unsure."

"Now, you're not?"

"No."

"Seems like it was a bit preliminary to release her from protective custody."

Don didn't even flinch. "Vision is always twenty-twenty in hindsight," Don said coolly sizing up the Assistant Director up.

Megan did the same. Even if Colby's suspicions were true, how could someone who seemed so outwardly benign continue to play such draconian games? Their second task was daunting.

"Is there anything further?"

"Yes, sir. I need to request administrative leave and while I'm gone I'd like to place Agent Reeves in charge of the investigation."

"Excuse me?" Dolon said caught completely off-guard.

"I believe this is more than a single missing person case. My brother's also missing."

"Your brother?" the Assistant Director echoed dumbly.

"You didn't know, sir?" Don asked unable to keep the biting edge from his voice.

"No, I didn't." The Assistant Director calmly looked out the window at the low morning sun.

"It's Black R—"

"Yes, it's black right now, bleak too," Megan butted in, metaphorically stamping on Don's foot. He wore a bitter-lemon expression, but took the hint to shut up. "However, we may have located a third person of interest. He's dead, but I'll be interested in the results of the autopsy. There isn't a positive ID on the body yet," Megan added, deliberately not adding who they suspected it was. "I've assigned Agents Sinclair and Granger to—"

"Granger's about to be reassigned," Dolon wrenched his gaze away from the glass building across the way.

"I know," she said, and in the tension felt the pinpricks of the hair on her arms standing on end, "but it will take some time for the paperwork to clear and since he's a solid Agent I'd like to use him. We all have vested interest in this case."

"Personal interest?" he queried.

"And professional. Dr. Eppes'"—referring to Charlie that way may have felt foreign, but keeping this professional was too important—"techniques have saved us more times than I can count." Even if he wasn't Don's kin, they owed him. Big time.

There was a twist to his lips, but he nodded. "Permission granted."

One hurdle cleared. In for penny, in for a pound. "Furthermore, our initial investigations indicate that some of the NSA work Dr. Eppes was hired for may be related. The current motive is assumed to be retaliation."

She held her breath and the Assistant Director's attention. _I'm just an eager Agent doing her job. You like me. You want to hire me. _

"Undoubtedly it is," Dolon replied darkly. "However, you should _not_ go sniffing around in the NSA's business."

"I—we—understand," Megan said repressing the urge to shiver. If it turned out that the NSA was in bed with Black Rain she had no intention of acquiescing meekly. Understanding, after all, was different from obeying. Neither did Don. "But would it be possible to receive a list of names from Agent Westwood of people who would have known about Dr. Eppes' work."

"I'll see what I can do. I offer no guarantees, but I will try." As soon as they'd left his office he'd probably be phoning Westwood directly for the complete scoop. Michael Dolon wasn't the sort of man who appreciated being blindsided or kept in the dark.

"Thank you. We both appreciate it," Megan spoke for Don.

"Eppes, I want to apologize for your situation and offer my sincerest condolences to you and the rest of your family."

She didn't like how the man made it seem as if Charlie was already dead and gone. "Thank you, sir," Megan replied speaking for Don, who may as well have been muzzled. "Please let me know the status of procuring information from the NSA as soon as you have the opportunity to ask. I'll do the same with the status of our investigation."

"I'll do so."

"Thank you, sir," Megan said and ushered Don from the room without a backwards glance.

Docile, he let her shepherd him to the safety of their work area. Once he collapsed into his chair, Don cleared his throat like he was emerging from winter hibernation. "I'm glad that's over."

"Me too."

"Do you think he was lying?"

"About knowing Charlie was gone?"

"Yeah."

"I don't think he was. He seemed genuinely surprised," she said, dropping into her own chair. "And pissed," she added a heartbeat later.

"Which means someone is acting without his knowledge."

"That isn't any more of a comfort." Don leaned forward and put his head in his hands. "I don't know how Colby did it," Don admitted.

"Did what?"

"Questioned direct orders from his superior officer."

All in all, they were all locked in quite the nasty moral dilemma, she reflected. "He didn't have another ethical choice and neither do we."

"What if we're wrong?"

"Then we pay the price, but if we're right…." If they were right and did nothing, she wouldn't be able to live with herself. None of them could.

"Tell me there'll be good days again," he whispered.

"Oh, Don." Talk about role reversal. "There will be," she assured him hoping she wasn't lying herself. "Lots of them."

"Thanks. I needed to hear that," he said and smiled at her through his fingers. "I'm just…tired."

"I need you to get some sleep."

He sat up straight and dropped his hands. He knew full well she hadn't slept a wink the previous night either. "If you were me, could you sleep?"

"It would be nice if at least one of us could get some rest and since I need to work, it can't be me."

"I wish I could help."

Megan didn't throw her hands up in the air, but it was a close thing. The man had just formally requested leave and he still wanted to work. Who was Don Eppes without work to define him? She doubted even he knew. "You need to go home, Don," she countered ignoring his protest.

"I don't want—"

"I know you don't," she cut him off gently. "But you're only going to get in the way if you stay. Let us work. Trust us. We'll take care of things."

"That's what I have to do, isn't it?"

"Umm, humm."

He closed his eyelids, and she hoped that he wasn't imagining nightmares behind them. "I don't know if I can."

"You can. Come on, let me drive you home."

-oOo-


	9. Janus and Epimetheus

** Chapter IX: Janus and Epimetheus **

The moment Colby stepped past a LAPD officer and into Markenson's hotel suite he was hit with sheer opulence. The sitting room boasted plush carpet, two richly upholstered sofas engulfed with throw pillows, an ornate coffee table, a built-in housing a big screen television, and—of all things—a crystal chandelier. An uneaten array of breakfast foods on several china plates sat on a mobile kitchen cart in just inside the room. There was even a vase with a red rose on the cart.

People actually lived like this?

It was nice to see that the NSA's budget was going to such a worthwhile cause as keeping its people living in the lap of luxury. Well, Markenson wasn't technically living anymore, now was he?

The door to the immediate right led into an office and through the open door Colby glimpsed a matching desk and credenza set along with another uniformed officer, a man dressed in a hotel uniform, and a woman dressed in a suit. There was a door further down that must have led to the bedroom. A uniformed LAPD lieutenant met him and David before they could make it to the center of the suite's main room.

"We're with the FBI," David said flashing his badge before the man could open his mouth to protest. "I'm Agent David Sinclair."

"Lieutenant Randall Alexander," the man replied and offered his hand to David. He wore a friendly smile and he fit the plump donut eating cliché image of a middle aged cop.

"Agent Granger," Colby said firmly shaking Alexander's hand.

There was a spark of recognition in the other man's eyes as he digested their names. "You're on Don Eppes' team?"

"Yeah, that's correct," Colby said as he released the man's grip. He didn't bother to add that Don Eppes wasn't currently in charge at the moment or allowed to give them orders. "Body in the bedroom?"

"Yes, I'll take you guys on back."

"That'd be great," David replied.

The room smelled like death and it had all the hallmarks of a typical suicide scene: a half-full glass of water on the nightstand, an empty bottle of prescription Valium clutched in the deceased's hand, and a scrawled note on the floor next to the king sized bed. The fact that it looked so perfectly routine set Colby's teeth on edge and sounded the warning bells. A quick glance at David showed he felt roughly the same.

Alexander handed them both pairs of gloves. David took his pair, but he made no move to put them on. Clearly identification was going to be Colby's responsibility. As Colby slid the gloves on he reflected once more how much he despised the blunted sensitivity of the latex, but he also knew better than to disturb or mishandle any evidence. It seemed that duty always warred with desire.

"May I?" Colby asked Alexander before he reached out to move back the drape over the body.

"Be my guest."

He pulled the white drape down enough to reveal the head and one look at the body confirmed it was the bastard Markenson. He continued to pull the drape back and saw that Markenson's body lay sprawled on top of the comforter. He was still fully dressed in a pin striped dress shirt, a solid blue tie, and below his belt he wore charcoal grey slacks. The matching jacket was draped across the end of the bed. And while the cuff on his right side of his shirt was unbuttoned, all his other clothing was meticulous.

When David unearthed the evidence that Markenson had also worked for Black Rain Colby couldn't help but wonder if Markenson was playing Westwood, or if Westwood was playing Markenson.

Markenson's head lolled disturbingly to one side and so Colby reached out and gently tipped Markenson's pale face towards him. The lax neck muscles didn't resist but the heavy weight of the man's head was an interesting counterpoint. Even through the gloves Markenson's freckled skin felt clammy. His red hair contrasted with blue tinged lips and fingernails.

The last time Colby had seen Markenson his face had been flushed with life and excitement. Westwood may have been his handler, but Markenson was always one step ahead.

Colby couldn't count the number of dead people he'd seen any more than he could count the number of people he'd killed, but it had never stopped him from wondering what his own death would be like.

Would it be better to die in a hail of bullets or to be force fed a lethal cocktail of drugs? To be killed by the enemy or to be killed by your country? To die in an instant or to have life slowly leached out of you? Peaceful sleep or eternal torment? Heaven or Hell? If he was dead, did it matter how it happened?

Someday, probably sooner than later, it would be him, Colby had no illusions about that. He just hoped his death—and life—would mean something to either his nation or his friends.

If it didn't, then what this for? What was _any_ of it for?

"Is it him?" David asked and the clipped question snapped Colby out of his depressing ponderings.

Colby looked up and noticed that David still hovered in the open doorway. "It's Markenson."

"Then it's confirmed." The undertone was that Colby should never have doubted David's initial report at all. "I'll go and check the rest of the suite." David tossed his unused gloves back to Alexander and tapped the door jam before he turned around to leave. Colby nodded and bit back a sigh and a snarl. He knew they were going to have to talk. The sooner the better. However, David was going to have to be the one to make the first move.

"I'm no coroner, but I suspect the time of death was sometime between ten and one in the morning," Alexander said.

"You're probably correct, but if it's all the same to you I'll like the body examined by our coroner." Despite himself he grinned. Talking with Claudia would definitely put David in a bit better of a mood.

"Fine by me. If you don't mind me asking why're you feds interested in this at all?"

"Justin Markenson was NSA," Colby replied as he checked his watch. He still had an hour before he needed to be at the café to meet Chen. There was still plenty of time for further investigation.

"That explains it then." Lieutenant Alexander said. The man picked up an evidence bag with a single sheet of paper inside. "He left a suicide note. We found it about where you're standing." Alexander pointed across the bed and body to Colby. "It's an average suicide note on one side."

"Oh?"

"It starts with the standard life's not worth living passage and them moves into a goodbye world and screw you section—all of it neatly printed and legible too. It isn't too interesting. Then when you flip it over"—Alexander did so—"there's a scribbled note on the back. It's much harder to make out."

"What's it say?" Colby asked as he redraped the body. Wonder where the pen went? Colby scanned the floor and found a lone pen cap a few inches from the bed, but beyond that he didn't see anything other than carpet fibers.

Alexander paused as he tilted the paper about forty-five degrees hoping to make it easier to read. "'Even'" he paused puzzling through the plastic at the next word, "'Dora is military. Eastern,'" he paused again and squinted at the note, "I'm not sure what the next word is."

While Alexander muttered under his breath trying to match the scrawl with actual words Colby squatted down and moved the bed skirt out of the way. On his knees he peered under the bed and sure enough there was an uncapped black and green pen with the Bonaventure Hotel crest and phone number resting a couple of centimeters from his nose.

"Tropics maybe?" Alexander shrugged as Colby stood up again. "'Eastern tropics have encl… enclosed… ecli… eclipsed….' then the only part of the next two words I can make out are the first letters: U and S. They're very large."

"Well, I did find the pen he wrote it with," Colby said pointing under the bed. "Is there another evidence bag somewhere?"

"Yeah, I'll get you one. Take the note for a sec." Alexander handed over the letter across the bed and the body. Colby accepted it.

It was written on a piece of hotel stationary and seeing the scrawl for himself Colby wasn't surprised that Alexander had so much trouble reading it aloud. Didn't Charlie have some fancy algorithm for handwriting analysis? Given an expert—who was missing—and a bit of time—which they didn't have—perhaps they could decode it, figure out Markenson's dying intent. In the meantime, just the word 'military' sent a chill up his spine.

"I wonder how far into hallucinations he was when he penned this nonsense?" Colby asked trying for levity when he felt dread once Alexander got the bag and walked over to Colby's side of the bed.

"Pretty far I'd say," Alexander said when said bending down to take care of the pen.

Colby gave a false, tight smile and then he cleared his throat to change the subject. "Who found the body?"

"Room service. The employee's in the other room giving his statement. With his unhappy manager."

"Not happy to have a dead body in the hotel?"

"Not happy with the inconvenience of telling her other high-paying guests, I believe."

"Ahhhh. Mind if I go and listen in?" Colby asked, stripping off the gloves.

"Go on. I'll finish dealing with the pen and see about arranging a pickup"—he pointed to his cell phone—"for the body so it can be transferred to your coroner."

"Make sure it comes to the attention of Claudia Gomez."

"Gomez," Alexander repeated. "I got it."

"Appreciate it."

"Don't mention it. Once I make a few calls it'll be one less thing I have to worry about today. Besides, Lieutenant Walker tells me you're the good guys."

"Thanks."

He sure hoped they were the good guys in this little tale.

The office was just as spacious and ostentatious as the sitting room and the bedroom. The desktop was bare, but there was an Ethernet cable still plugged into the jack, which meant that whoever killed Markenson also took the laptop. On the far wall there was a large safe nestled in one of the full length bookshelves. Colby was willing to bet that whatever Markenson had put in there for safe keeping wasn't there anymore.

In the middle of the room David and another LAPD cop were questioning the room service employee while his boss hovered over the scene and tried not to wring her hands.

"Yes, I delivered the breakfast," the hotel employee answered the question that Colby had obviously missed. Benardo, as the stitchery on his hotel uniform dubbed him, had a faint trace of a Spanish accent, but he covered it up very well. "Last night, when I brought him dessert, he was insistent on an early breakfast. He told me that he'd probably be in the shower so I was to bring breakfast directly in without waiting."

"You delivered both dessert and breakfast, Benardo?" David asked, skeptical.

"Eva,"—he gestured to his boss—"assigned me to work the night shift this week. I brought dessert when I came on shift and then his early breakfast was one of my last responsibilities."

"Go on," David prompted.

"So I knocked on the door, but there was no answer. Following his instructions from last night I entered with the breakfast cart. It was too quiet and the shower wasn't running." Because of his habitual interviewing and interrogation skills Colby realized that Benardo, with mastery of two languages and all the sound references, was definitely an auditory individual.

"I'm listening," David said, falling back on his own training as he tuned himself into the interviewee's wavelength.

"I went to knock on the bedroom door to announce breakfast was here. I figured he might still be sleeping. He didn't answer, but my knock pushed the door open and I saw the body. I froze for a moment. I didn't know what to do. I've never seen a dead person before. Only in movies, you know." Colby casually leaned against the door jamb and stuffed his hands in his jean pockets. Oh, how he envied Benardo. Tremendously. "Then I called Eva," he gestured to his supervisor, "and she called the cops."

"Let's go back to last night. Can you describe what you heard then?"

"Sure," Benardo's eyes shifted to his left as he remembered." When I knocked on the door he was humming to himself." From the expression on Benardo's face that humming had been woefully out of tune. "I brought the champagne and cake tray into the room and his cell rang."

"Did you catch who he was talking to?" David asked. Colby made a mental note to get a record of all the calls Markenson had made in the past few days.

Out of the corner of his eye he noted the man's supervisor twitch. When Colby focused his full attention on her, her expression was calm and serene. She met his gaze boldly. She was all show and no substance. Her makeup, even at this early hour, was immaculate. She dressed with the intent of distracting all members of the opposite sex; her necklace hung low and deliberately drew attention to her silicon-enhanced breasts.

Colby had seen better.

Naomi Vaughn's weren't implants. He shook his head to dispel the random thought. He needed more coffee if his thoughts were getting this muddled. Naomi Vaughn would never speak to him again... assuming he could rescue her in the first place.

Eva tossed her long hair over her shoulder as and she sized him up in return. Her gaze lingered a touch too long on his biceps and below the belt. Let the ninny believe he was all brawn and no brain. She clearly liked what he saw; he wanted to take a shower.

"I didn't catch a name, no sir," Benardo replied.

"That's okay. Do you know what time that was?"

"Just after nine o'clock, but…" Benardo hesitated and chewed the inside of his lip and again he looked to his left. The eye cues were again indicative of memory rather than construction and Colby felt the hotel employee was most likely telling the truth.

"Yes?"

"It seemed as if he was expecting the call."

"That's good to know. Do you remember any of the conversation?" David asked.

"It was short. He told whoever was on the other end his room number and asked him to come on up."

"Him?"

"The tinny voice on the other end was deep. It wasn't a woman."

"Then what happened," David prompted.

"He handed me a large tip, gave me his breakfast order for the morning, and gave me the instructions I told you about earlier. I left shortly after that."

"When was the next time you were in this hotel room?"

"Two hours ago when I delivered the breakfast cart. At five sharp."

"Let's jump back again," David said to redirect the line of questioning. It didn't seem like the man was lying, but it didn't hurt to check for a rehearsed statements. Benardo nodded again accepting the shift. "Did you retrieve the dessert tray?"

"'Bout three in the morning. When I made my rounds."

"Did you pass anyone in the hall?"

"No, sir."

"What about when you left the dessert and champagne?"

"The gentleman in room 1811 was _escorting_ a young woman back to his suite," he said delicately and the implication was she was a high-priced woman of the evening. "He stopped me to ask for more towels and an extra bathrobe. I had maid service send some fresh ones up. Promptly."

"No one else?"

Benardo shook his head.

"I think that's all the questions I have for now. Can we get your contact information?" David asked. "Your address and phone number in case we need to get a hold of you for some more questions."

"Okay. Do you have a pen or somethin'?"

The LAPD officer put a fresh piece of paper on the desk and handed Benardo a pen. Colby noted that he took it with his right hand. Eye movements were never a slam dunk, but it helped to know which hand was the dominant one.

"Eva, can I take off for the day?" he asked his supervisor once he had finished putting down all his contact information.

"You may. Get some sleep. I'm sorry we had to keep you longer than usual. Make sure you add the extra hours to your time card," Eva said.

"Overtime, Ma'am?"

"Yes, of course," she replied warmly. Too warmly.

"Gracias." Benardo gave them all half bows and approached the door—and Colby.

Eva Rodriguez dropped the smile the instant Benardo's back was turned. She didn't want to have to pay the man time and a half, but needed to keep face with all the police officers and FBI agents in the room.

"What do you think your friends will say when you tell them about what you discovered this morning?" Colby asked before Benardo could pass him and head out into the main suite.

This time he looked to the right to construct the imaginary conversation. Benardo passed his test. "I imagine they'll be shocked and won't believe me."

"You're right about that." Colby said and moved out of the way. Without looking back, Benardo left the room and suite.

"Ms. Rodriguez," David said turning to the hotel manager once Benardo was out of hearing range. "How spotless of a record does Benardo have?"

"Not very spotless," she replied promptly. "His record is sub par, actually."

"Really?" the LAPD agent—his name tag read Leonard Kipp—asked, cocking an eyebrow.

"If only I could paint you a picture." With the inordinate amount of attention she paid to her appearance coupled with her frank appraisal of his…ahem…assets, he deduced Ms. Rodriguez was much more of a visual person than her employee. "You see, he's a lyricist and musician on the side," she elaborated and crossed her arms across her chest protectively and the fake diamonds of her necklace burrowed into the valley between her breasts. "Unfortunately, his head isn't where it should be most of the time because to him this job is just a way to pay the bills until he hits it big."

Interesting. Colby's impression had been that her employee had been quite competent and his head seemed quite clear. He remembered quite a bit about the events of the past few hours. Was she deliberately smearing him? And to what end?

"Do you keep employee reviews and employee records on file?" Kipp asked.

"We do. I'll be happy to show Benardo's to you if you'd like." _I'm sure you would be_, Colby thought to himself. She was a bit overeager to dish out the dirt about her employee.

"Yes, it would be good if we could see those," officer Kipp replied and Eva Rodriguez smiled. "We'll also need to have a look at the records of all your employees who have been working in the past week or so."

"Certainly."

"And a record of all your guests," David chimed in.

The look in her eyes went as cold as she looked at David. "You'll need a warrant for that."

"Then we'll get one, Ma'am," he said full his voice full of courtesy.

"Hotel policy," she said unapologetically. "We have an international reputation to maintain."

"Did Mr. Markenson have anything held at the front desk for anyone else to pickup?" Kipp asked drawing her attention away.

"No." She shook her head. "Nothing."

David followed the line of questioning. "Has there been any mail or faxes held for Mr. Markenson since he checked in?"

"Nothing that I can tell you about," she replied.

Tell.

What an interesting word choice. That implied that there may have actually been something. Or there was some business Markenson was involved in that she was aware of. David met his eyes directly and Colby bit his lip in order to stay silent. Regardless of their current personal problems there was a reason they made an excellent team, made excellent partners. Colby nodded in understanding. Message received. David could play the bad cop for now and Colby's part would come after he was done.

"Are you certain?" David asked.

"Perfectly," she replied primly. "What reason would I have to lie to you?"

David let the implication hanging and pushed on. "What's your hotel policy about opening safes?" he pointed to the locked safe in the bookshelf.

"You'll also need a warrant for that," the woman answered.

"Do you make video recordings of your guests?"

"For security purposes, naturally," the woman stressed the word naturally as if he were insulted by the very implication that they wouldn't. She also left out any offer for them to look at them.

"Don't worry, we'll have a judge issue a warrant for that too," David said wryly.

"I'm sure you will," she said darkly. "If there isn't anything else, then I'd like to head downstairs and see if I can mediate any of the brouhaha you officers have stirred up."

"There's a dead body in the other room. It's hardly brouhaha. The investigation is going to take some time."

"As far as I'm concerned the guest in room 1814 had more champagne and prescription pain killers than any human should."

"That's what it appears like," David said straight-faced.

"Appears?" She tilted her head to the side and some of her hair fell into her face. "Do you suspect foul play?" she asked oh-so-nonchalantly as she brushed the hair out of her eyes and pushed it over her shoulder. Once that was done she brushed some imaginary fluff off her shoulder as well.

Foul play? Colby managed, just barely, not to pull a face. She'd made their investigation sound like a bad detective novel. Interesting that she would even question it, that clinched it; she did know something and she was fishing.

"It's probably certain that it was suicide," David lied, trying to deflect any worries that she might have about the hotel's reputation, or her involvement in Markenson's death. "We just like to be thorough and not leave any stone unturned."

"Alright then," she said rising gracefully like a swan from the chair she'd been seated in for the duration of her interview. "Please try to stay out of the way of our paying guests."

"We'll do what we can," David assured her.

"See to it." She spun on her high heels and walked towards the door.

Time to play good cop.

When she approached, Colby deliberately didn't give ground. She was forced—the pleasure of the act showed on her face when she winked wickedly at him—to brush against him to exit the office area; he was hit with a whiff of her cloying, cheap perfume.

"Ms. Rodriguez?" Colby asked following her into the main room.

"Please call me Eva," she said turning around. She held out her hand and he took it. Her grip was feather light, but despite her overuse of moisturizer the palm of her hand was cold. He shook it because he supposed kissing it would be a little extreme.

"Colby."

"Colby," she repeated, tasting his name, letting it roll off her tongue like honey. "Is there something you want?" She took her right hand and put it on her hip to emphasize her figure.

He knew he was going to have to butter her up and the notion made him queasy. "Many, many things," he charmed her. "But I'd like to apologize for my partner. I'm sorry about the inconvenience. We'll try to get out of your way as soon as possible."

"Why thank you."

He reached out and squeezed her arm gently. "I do have a question I'd like to ask. Something my partner neglected to ask." He gave a long suffering sigh as if to imply David was an incompetent.

"What is it?" she asked and batted her eyelashes. It was pitiful.

Colby released her arm. "Mr. Markenson checked into the hotel on Friday morning, correct?"

"Yes, I checked him in personally."

"Did he check in alone?" Colby asked.

"No," she closed her eyes briefly as if she were trying to remember a name. "A Mr. Westwood checked in as well. They appeared to be such nice men."

Don was right. Now they had independent confirmation that Markenson and Westwood had all arrived Friday just as Ashby was trying to blow up the bridge. "Just one other? No one else was with them?"

"Just the two of them," she confirmed.

"I see." Hummm…. Dolon was probably staying at another hotel. The NSA and the FBI my work together occasionally, but the blood between them was thinner than water.

"If there's anything else you need, don't hesitate to ask," she purred.

"There is something I'd like you to do."

"Name it." Did she seriously expect him to make a pass at her?

"I'd like to visualize something for me. Close your eyes."

She looked at him askance. "You're serious?"

"Yes, go on close them." She gave a little giggle as she obeyed. "Imagine a warm sandy beach," Colby said and let his voice hit the rumbling tone he knew turned women to putty as he leaned in close. "A crystal clear'n cloudless day ending with a fire-red sunset, skimpy swimsuits and flimsy shoes, and cold drinks with umbrellas in them."

Her lips twitched. "Am I'm going to need a cabana boy to bring me that drink?"

"Call him Pedro."

"Pedro?" Her eyes fluttered open. "I don't think that's his first name." God! She'd cast him the role of the cabana boy.

"I'll let you pick the name. Close your eyes again." She did. "I want to you picture that beach and that man. Feel like you're there. You got that?"

"Umm hummm."

"Good," he whispered in her ear seductively. "If you lie in a criminal investigation again then the closest you'll ever get to that beach will be while you are dreaming in a jail cell." He didn't bother to keep the sneer from his voice as he finished.

Her eyes snapped open. "Why would yo—" she cut herself off before she could betray anything else.

He leaned in even closer. "I can play bad cop too. You understand, don't you?"

"I do. Pity," she spat, "I rather liked you before you opened your mouth."

"And I knew what kind of woman you were before you even opened yours."

She reared back and slapped him. Hard. The impact made his eyes water and though he didn't see her flounce out in a huff he heard the door slam. He rubbed his jaw as David came up next to him.

"Nice going, Casanova," David laughed.

"Next time you get to play the good cop," he grumbled. It almost seemed like old times.

"Was it worth it?"

"I'm convinced she knew something about Markenson's clandestine activities. And now she knows that we know. She'll slip up." Colby stopped rubbing his stinging jaw. "In the meantime my cheek stings like a b—"

"Gomez?" Lieutenant Alexander poked his head out the bedroom door with his phone glued to his ear.

"That's correct."

Alexander, jabbering on his phone, ducked back into the bedroom.

"I asked them for custody of the body," Colby said off David's look.

"Why?"

"Because I want first look at the autopsy."

"And you want Claudia to do it?"

"Exactly."

Despite the circumstances there was a gleam in David's eyes when he mentioned Claudia's name. Everyone seemed neatly paired up: David and Claudia, Don and Liz, Megan and Larry, Charlie and Amita, Alan and Mille. He was the odd one out in couplehood bliss.

It was his choice, but it hurt more than his tender cheek.

David shifted his feet. "I am sorry."

"She didn't hit me that hard."

"No, I meant for earlier."

"Sticks and stones," Colby tried to wave it away.

"Funny. I always thought the quote would be better if it was 'sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will always hurt me.' It doesn't excuse what I said, but I'd always figured I was your best friend—that I knew everything about you."

Colby looked over his shoulder, but they were alone and no one was in earshot. "Friendship isn't a contest, David. I don't know if it was in my file or not, but Dwayne was with me every step of the way for those nineteen days. Both you and Dwayne were my best friend at different times in my life."

"How could he've been your best friend? Dwayne's guilty of espionage," David countered, his voice pitched to a whisper on the final word.

"_Is_ he?"

"Don't give me that. You brought him in yourself."

"Yeah, but who told me to?" Colby countered.

"Don did," David replied quickly, "because Megan and I had to convince him to."

"I haven't always reported solely to Don. He wasn't the only one I cleared it with. What Dwayne's going through could just as easily be me. I have no guarantee that I won't be locked up after this is over. Or that I'll—" he couldn't bring himself to finish the thought.

"Or that you'll end up dead like our friend Markenson?" David finished for him.

"You understand?"

"Maybe not understand, but I do acknowledge your difficulty."

Colby checked his watch for the time again. He needed to get going, or he'd be late. "Do you think you can handle the rest from here? I have a meeting I need to get to."

"A meeting?" David's eyes narrowed. He didn't like that.

"It's important," Colby assured him, hypersensitive of the fact they really couldn't have an entirely private conversation with the Los Angeles police force milling about.

"More important than this investigation?" David asked him, clearly unhappy with the revelation.

"It is for this investigation." Colby held his breath hoping the entire preceding conversation and apology hadn't just been invalidated.

"What do you want me to tell Megan? That you skipped out?"

"I warned her that I had something to do that I couldn't avoid. Now, I'm tellin' you the same thing." Colby looked at David levelly. "I'm gonna be unavailable for the next few hours."

David read between the lines. "We're in this together. "

"No," Colby denied, "I'm still—"

"Still expecting us to back out?" David finished.

David had hit it on the nose. When hadn't someone drop-kicked him to the curb and left him to fend for himself? "Look, I'm trying to protect you three. Four if you count Charlie. I've got the most to lose and while I appreciate your help—"

"Stop trying to shield us. For us to survive this with our careers—"

"With our lives," Colby hissed.

"—intact there can't be any secrets between us."

"Tonight," Colby assured him.

"Fine. Tonight. I'm going to hold you to that." David wasn't happy, but he wasn't about to argue in the hotel suite. "Do you need a ride to wherever you're going?"

"I can walk. Besides, it probably wouldn't be a good thing to have you anywhere nearby while I do what I gotta do."

"I'll let Megan know. Take care."

"Thanks." Colby turned and he had his hand on the door knob when he hesitated. "For what it's worth, if I needed someone to guard my back and my choice was between you and Dwayne. I'd choose you without question."

Colby was out the door before he could hear David's reply.

-oOo-

By the time Megan had dropped him off at the house everyone was there: his father, Amita, Larry, and Millie. There may have been only four of them but they swarmed him the moment he stepped over the threshold.

"What did you find out?"

"Do they know who took Charlie?"

"What can you tell us?"

"Did they know where he is?"

Don slowly shut the door before saying, "Hello." His greeting didn't stem the tide of their questions in the least.

"Anything?"

"Do they know who was behind it?"

"What did the Assistant Director say?"

"Do they know anything?"

He held up his hands in self defense. "I don't know much. The team is working on some solid leads. Megan promises that she'll call to check in regularly and especially when they have something concrete. Other than that I can't tell you much more."

To avoid everyone's crestfallen expressions he plowed through the crowd and picked up a piece of mail from the green fluted bowl. He could feel them all staring at his back, burning holes no doubt. The letter contained a bill from Verizon Wireless. He owed forty-nine dollars and ninety-five cents.

Owed.

He owed Charlie protection. He owed his country duty. He owed his team leadership. He owed his friends and family more of an explanation, but couldn't bring himself to admit he was impotent. Blindly he reached for the next letter in the stack. It was noticeably thick.

"Donnie," his father began, "what about—"

"I don't know ANYTHING!" Don shouted. He ripped into the envelope violently and a small black piece of plastic fell to the floor.

Silence reigned and no one asked another blasted question.

The hush stretched too long and he took a deep breath to steady himself. When he turned around his father wore a hurt expression, there were tears in Amita's eyes again which were threatening to spill down her cheeks, Millie looked affronted, and Larry imitated stone.

"I'm sorry," he apologized. He meant it. "I honestly don't know much. Megan has assigned an agent to watch the house, so if you see them outside don't be alarmed. We think there may be a connection with another missing person case—Naomi Vaughn."

"She's missing?" Amita asked.

"Unfortunately," Don said, refusing to feel guilty about what part he may have played in releasing her too soon. "David and Colby were leaving to check out a lead. Then I spoke with Assistant Director Dolon and asked to have myself put on leave for the duration of the case. Afterwards Megan drove me home." And now that he thought about it he'd left his car in the FBI garage. How was he going to get it back?

Disgusted with himself he extracted the multiple pages of the letter. He leafed through the sheets, but they were all blank. Who sends blank pages in the mail?

Correction. All blank but the last one. When he read it, it sent cold chills down his spine. It read: _If you are reading this I am dead. I trust you will not lack foresight like Epimetheus._

The letter wasn't signed, but it must have been from Ashby. He tuned the envelope over, but there was no return address. The stamp indicated that it had been mailed on Friday May 18, 2007 at 10:04 in the morning. Ashby mailed this five days ago! He must have deposited it at the post office before he'd headed to the bridge last Friday.

"Donnie, what's wrong? You're as white as a sheet."

"Is that a ransom note?" Millie asked.

"No. It's… I'm not sure what it is actually." He knew it wasn't good. That was for damn sure. "Does anyone know who Epi… Epime…." Don attempted to pronounce the name, but failed.

Larry tiptoed closer and Don passed him the letter. Larry read it aloud to everyone.

"Glad you can pronounce Epimetheus,"—the name sounded foreign on his tongue—"but who in the bloody hell is he?" Don said once everyone knew its contents.

"Epimetheus is a Titan in Greek myth," Millie answered. "He wasn't the brightest of gods. His brother was Prometheus and his wife was Pandora."

"As in Pandora's box?"

Millie nodded. "The very same."

"Fantastic," Don said sarcastically. Bloody, fucking fantastic! He knew there was a reason he shouldn't have been screwing around in his mythology class in high school.

"Epimetheus is also one of Saturn's moons," Amita revealed. "It shares a co-orbit with…" she faltered, swallowed, and blinked back tears, "with Janus."

Don's head snapped around to look at his brother's girlfriend. "Janus?"

"Janus," Amita confirmed. "In between the F and G rings. The two moons swap positions relative to Saturn every four years or so. They tug on each other with equal and opposite forces and exchange angular momentum. It's a classic example of a three bodied problem that…" Amita trailed off and put her hand to her mouth. The tears spilled over. "I sound like Charlie," she whispered.

Larry handed Amita a handkerchief from his pocket. To cover up the awkward moment Millie stooped down and picked up the fallen bit of plastic.

"What is it?" Don asked.

"It's an eight megabyte memory disk," she replied, handing it over.

The small SanDisk square fit easily in the palm of his hand. He'd seen Charlie handle them millions of times moving data from one computer to another and—Charlie! He could hear Charlie's last words from their fight ringing in his ears. _You forgot your mail! _

The guilt piled on in thick swathes. If only he had checked his mail immediately when he came to the house Saturday evening instead of picking a fight, then things would have been different. He would have had the foresight to protect Charlie better, or at the very least apologize if they'd gotten into the fight anyways.

Janus is in your mailbox, indeed.

-oOo-


	10. Fair Trade

Chapter 10

** Chapter X: Fair Trade **

Back when the team had merely thought of Dwayne as a mole in the Department of Justice they'd had Charlie and Amita apply a branching and bounding algorithm to determine his extracurricular meeting places with his Chinese contact. Colby hadn't been stupid enough to write his own meeting dates and times down anywhere because it was simpler and safer; it would also be much harder to dub his trail "unexplained" if there were no calendar items for it. However, he couldn't help but wonder if there was anyone watching him as he strolled along 5th Street.

As far as Colby knew, Consulate General Chen had never known that the FBI had watched his clandestine meeting with Carter from a distance that night. Dolon and Westwood had squelched any further investigation and pulled strings to get any future surveillance jobs monitoring Chen under their supervision. He was an important contact, so they'd kept him fat, dumb, and happy.

As far as Colby knew, Don had never known there was a spy watching him watch that meeting either. A spy with the last name of Granger. He'd approached the situation from the other angle and had followed Chen. Plus the meeting list had been burned in his memory.

He relaxed his shoulder muscles and purposefully didn't look around for those unseen, eyes. He was simply a man on a late morning coffee run—a man armed with more than just his standard Glock.

Was it truly better to know the truth instead of believing the lie?

Squelching a sigh, Colby left the philosophical thoughts to Fleinhardt and pushed the Starbucks door open. He was immediately hit with the aroma of fresh coffee and strains of soft music from the speakers above. He got in line, stared up at the huge menu board and, despite his exhaustion, tried not to let the words swim and blur before him.

There were too many choices, too many combinations of what to order. The sheer array of decisions he'd have to make to get a blasted cup of joe was dizzying. Did he want something hot like drip-brewed coffee, something espresso-based, or Tazo tea? Or did he want something cold like a frappuccino, or iced tea? What about something in between? He could get it served lawyer-warning hot, lukewarm, or icy cold.

Megan's earlier comment about his cold logic intruded into his thoughts. He may have brushed off her accusation, but it was much easier to evaluate the choices another person should make rather than those you had to make for yourself. Plus, the impacts would be far less…

Personal.

Don had tried to get him to open up and he'd cracked a little bit. Needed to. Last night in the garage he'd told the team they'd have to individually decide to stay the course—wherever it might lead—because it wasn't a choice he would make for them. Which had the virtue of being fair, but also had the benefit of allowing him to slam on the brakes and step back to evaluate.

There were too many choices, too many chess moves with traps. Both David and Megan had called him on his stalling. Truth to tell, that's what it was. How much of his upcoming meeting with Chen would he share with the others? How much of his knowledge of those laser gyroscopes should he share with the others? Like he'd told Charlie, he just needed to see the chess board properly and the answer would come to him. There must be a way to protect them and win at the same time. There must be.

But did they need protecting?

At what point do you stop pulling punches? Stop letting them live the lie and force them out of the cave?

Could they protect him?

He shook his head and looked again to the menu as if it held all his answers. It was better to think of what he should order instead of the temperature of logic. Did he want milk, skim milk, soymilk, organic milk, or no milk in his coffee? Did he want to add sugar, Splenda, Equal, or Sweet'N Low? Did he want syrup? There was a staggering array of flavors: cinnamon dolce, vanilla, hazelnut, toffee nut, almond, peppermint, juicy raspberry, and caramel. Now was that regular syrup, or sugar-free syrup? Did he want fewer than normal pumps of syrup, or perhaps extra pumps of syrup? What about foam?

How is it even possible to order a single drink with this boggling list of potential ingredients? It was a wonder Starbucks sold one cup, let alone one billion.

But they did.

Thousands of people everyday came in, made their selections, and went about their lives content. He shouldn't be any different—with either his coffee or his friends.

"Trouble deciding?" The Asian woman directly in front of him in line asked him as she pocketed the phone she had been sending a text message with. He gave her a quick once over; she wasn't a threat.

"They have an overwhelming menu," he conceded.

"That's why I found my favorite and get it every time. It's simpler that way." She spoke without even a hint of an accent. "Do you do the same?" She smiled up at him inviting further conversation.

He wasn't interested. "Yeah," he grunted. It may be simpler, but lacked a risk and reward payoff.

He turned away from her to the pastry case. It held scones crammed with chocolate chips and large sugar sprinkles, muffins packed with blueberries and calories, danishes slathered thick with cream cheese, fritters stuffed with apples, croissants chock-full of almonds, and coffee cake topped with crumbles and icing.

His stomach churned unpleasantly. Well, he knew he wouldn't be ordering any food. He hadn't eaten since the Golden Dragon takeout he'd wolfed down before Don showed up and didn't think he could force himself to eat again any time soon.

He'd live off coffee; that would be enough.

Did he want a tall, a grande, or a venti size? Should his coffee be from Latin America, from Africa, from Arabia, from the Asia Pacific region, or did he want a multi-regional blend?

Multi-regional concerns were what got him into the mess to begin with. The woman in front of him finished ordering (a sugar-free no-foam extra-hot vanilla latte) and he still had no clue what he wanted. The barista, dressed in a black apron with a three leaf symbol and the words _Coffee Master_ splashed across it, turned her attention to him. "What would you like?"

Caffé latte, caffé Americano, mocha, macchiato, cappuccino, frappuccino—flippin' hell! He just needed coffee!

He shuffled forward, took his wallet out of his pocket, and as he opened his mouth to speak he spotted a brochure on the counter extolling the benefits of Fair Trade coffee. He eschewed the small farmer assistance, community development, and environmental stewardship bullet points and instead focused solely on one large calligraphy word—trade.

He'd been racking his brain for a move when he should have been searching how to exchange his pieces. Trade his shadow-spying orders for action, which necessitated revealing everything to his friends. And trusting them completely.

No holds barred.

He reached out and touched the brochure; it was slippery and slick, slippery like truth and slick like blood. He traced the curve of the script, fingerprints smudging the shiny surface. He could follow orders or make them; act instead of react. He could play the game instead of letting the game play him. His halo was already tarnished beyond repair, so it was long past time to drop the knight in shining armor suffering in silence mask.

"Sir?" the barista asked, snapping him out of his reverie.

The decision of what to drink seemed very petty now that he'd made a more important choice. "Something very strong," he replied. "I'm not picky about what it is."

Without batting an eyelash she rang up a venti latte with a fourth shot of espresso for him and asked for five dollars and ninety-five cents in change. He fumbled through his wallet and handed her a ten dollar bill.

He stuck the change he'd received into the tip cup. While he waited for his drink he snagged a coffee sleeve so he wouldn't burn his hands. He'd need an ace in the hole if he could turn himself into a player, he reflected. When he retrieved his latte is was indeed too hot to handle. He slipped the sleeve on, grateful for its protection.

Colby took a seat—back to the wall—and watched the other patrons enter, purchase their drinks, and leave. He had enough time for a scalding mouthful before Chen walked in.

They briefly made eye contact as the Consulate General took his place at the end of the line. Impeccably dressed—as always—Chen Kaj-Jan presented an image of a shrewd, sharp businessman; his currency was men instead of money.

It took approximately five minutes for Chen to advance to the front of the line and place his order. While he waited Colby proceeded to guzzle his latte. It was a great relief when the glorious caffeine hit his system. Despite the burned beans, the coffee really was quite good; he should go out for fancy Starbucks coffee more often. Enjoying the buzz, he watched Chen receive his drink and casually make his way to the door. Right before he opened it he casually flicked his gaze to Colby in an unmistakable command to follow.

Rising, he trailed Chen out the door and remained two steps behind the entire journey to the nearby park on 5th and Flower. He walked in the shadow of the Bonaventure hotel the whole way. Chen had seated himself on a wooden park bench and was sipping his drink seemingly without a care in the world.

"Good afternoon," the Consulate General greeted him formally when Colby entered hearing range.

"Afternoon," Colby replied, seating himself beside the man. "What is it you'd like to discuss?"

"The Janus List."

At least that was expected. If not welcome. "What about it?"

"Have you seen the list of names?"

"I am familiar with them," Colby said and took another swallow of his latte, his drink nearly empty. "Do you need me to smuggle a copy out for you?"

"No."

No? Westwood and Dolon weren't going to like that.

"Are you on it?" Chen asked with one eyebrow raised, testing him. Every conversation was a test with this man.

"I am."

He smiled. It wasn't pleasant. "It is good you do not lie to me."

"After everything I did to prove myself, after all the information I've delivered, you believe I'd play you false?"

"Not false, but I do wonder when your mercenary interests will take over. Men like you rarely turn state secrets because the whim strikes."

That rankled and he couldn't let it show. He'd accepted that he wasn't as pure as the driven snow, who was? But he had his principles: fidelity, bravery, integrity. To himself and his friends if not the men who ran the agency he worked for. Besides, it never snowed in Los Angeles; the palm trees across the park were proof enough of that. What he wouldn't give for a strong, proper Idaho pine tree. It took more than a puff of wind to make them rock.

"I do not require you to obtain the list because I already have it," Chen continued when Colby had been quiet for several heartbeats.

How was that possible? "You do?" Colby couldn't keep the surprise out of his voice.

"Last Saturday I received a letter at my private residence—not the Consulate—from Taylor Ashby," he explained. "It was most illuminating and in light of his recent activities—explosive. He wanted to broadcast his list of spies to the largest audience as possible and succeeded. Is your position secure with the other men you pretend to serve?"

"As secure as it has ever been."

"I will not trifle you with asking for the details of how you managed to evade your government. But to show my gratitude, I'd like to offer you a gift."

The strings attached to that gift must be a half a mile wide and long enough to tether him from Los Angeles across the ocean clear to Beijing. "Unlike Dwayne Carter, I don't believe you ever knew Ms. Kim," Chen commented.

"Michelle Kim? The former interpreter for the Chinese Consulate? That Ms. Kim?"

"Yes, that Ms. Kim. I'm impressed you remembered her."

How could he forget her? She'd slept with Dwayne so she could learn the identities of the federal witnesses scheduled to testify in the North Korea laser gyroscope case. "No, I never met her while she was alive." Where was this going?

"A pity. She was very… good at her job."

"I'm sure Dwayne enjoyed her company." Idiot couldn't keep it in his trousers.

"He did."

"She has a younger cousin," Chen said and looked away. Colby followed his line of site to the bench directly across from the one they were seated on.

The woman from the Starbucks line he'd met earlier had preceded them to the park. Her presence now and her conversation earlier hadn't been a coincidence. She was looking over at them—correction—her attention was exclusively focused on Colby. What was it with women throwing themselves at him today? She was less overt than Eva, but essentially it was the same thing.

He'd neglected it earlier, but he took a moment to profile her quickly, burning her image into his brain. She was younger—quite a bit younger—than he with flawless skin, a pert nose, and high cheekbones. Her wide eyes were decorated with smoky kohl, her lips were painted cherry red. Her long, waist length hair was a contrast to her petite frame. Her skirt revealed a generous portion of her thigh.

She was sex on a stick and he didn't even feel a stir of lust. She was one lollypop he didn't want. To Chen she was nothing more than chattel; the very concept sickened him.

"I don't need help finding women," Colby scoffed.

"Very well." Chen made a shoo sign—a quick flick of the wrist—and dismissed her. She rose from the bench and continued to walk along the park's path, never once tripping over her high, high heels. "You were always the one the Commander insisted was harder to break."

And Colby knew in that moment Dwayne had indeed transferred his loyalties to the Chinese—that's why Dolon and Westwood were unwilling to spring him from jail. He'd figured they'd been successful in their mission and procured the trust of the Chinese, but Dwayne must have cracked…given them something more.

"If it is not a woman you'd like, what may I offer you? Men? Money?"

Dwayne had fallen for that too. There wasn't anything that Chen could offer to purchase his loyalty, but he'd need to keep up appearances. "Safety." He managed not to choke on the request.

"Oh?"

"The palm trees and the Los Angeles smog no longer appeal to me. I've requested a transfer to the Beijing attaché office."

Chen cocked his head to the side and considered Colby as if he were buying a meal's worth of fine fish. "You would indeed be useful back home. There is no denying that."

Colby let out an exaggerated breath. "I was hoping you would say that."

"Your current position is tenuous at best and we are most upset about the fact Mr. Carter's transfer was delayed. Commander Ta-Ming Wang will be arriving in the United States before the week is over." Colby's blood ran cold. "When he arrives, I will bring the issue up with him."

"That's all I ask."

"However, your position, tenuous as it may be, is still useful. I have a personal request."

Colby spun his coffee cup in his hands. "Name it."

"In late November of 1992 the United States military conducted an operation known as Pandora." The hair on Colby's forearm stood on end. "I'd like the complete report and all details associated with it. Get this for me and I will do my utmost to ensure the Commander grants your request for a safe haven on Chinese soil."

"This may take me some time," he hedged.

"You have two days."

Chen got to his feet and he gave a mini bow of goodbye. "Remember spies die in wars, Lieutenant Granger. We live in dangerous, interesting times. I do believe that your safety for this information would be a fair and equitable exchange. Wouldn't you agree?"

He thought back to the coffee shop and smiled. "Yes, a fair trade."

"Until our next visit then."

Colby remained seated while the man walked away and drained the last of his now tepid coffee. As soon as Chen was out of his field of vision he got up and tossed his Starbucks cup into the nearby trash. His hands were shaky and he braced them on the lip of the can. He couldn't decide if it was the caffeine or the conversation that was causing it.

Watching the neatly arranged plot of palm trees start to sway, he decided it must be the caffeine.

Definitely too much caffeine.

-oOo-

"What did Claudia have to say?" Megan asked David when he returned to the bullpen after his visit to the morgue. Megan had been more than happy to leave that visit to David. The very thought of a morgue made her shiver. She'd never understand why anyone would voluntarily become a coroner.

"She had time to write up something very preliminary," he handed her a thin stack of papers. "See for yourself."

Megan had never liked all the medial jargon associated with such reports, and toxicology reports like this one had it in spades. Plus, she was getting too tired to read and retain the information. She tossed them onto her increasingly cluttered desk. "Give me the Cliff Notes version."

"There was a puncture mark on Markenson's right arm and Claudia suspects someone also shot him full of morphine. There was also some fluid in his lungs to support this. Combined with the Valium we found with the body, he had a very quiet passing. Did you find out why he had the prescription for the Valium in the first place?" David asked her dropping into his seat.

"According to the prescribing physician they were for anxiety."

"Anxiety?" he echoed.

"I'm not comforted by that fact either," she assured him. "I went digging for any sort of psychiatrist or psychologist who he might have been seeing in addition to,"—she consulted her notes—"Dr. Greengrass, but I haven't had any luck."

"Did you find a judge who'd issue a warrant for the hotel's clientele records?"

"We'll have them tomorrow at the earliest," Megan replied and tried not to frown at the thought of a delay. Her stomach rumbled and she wrapped her free arm about herself as if that would stop the noise.

"Hungry?" David asked, smiling.

"Obviously."

"Me too," he admitted.

She put her notes down and reached for her purse. "Want something from Sunshine's Deli downstairs? I'll make a quick trip."

"A sandwich, chips. Nothing fancy."

"Okay. I'll get something for Colby too." Before she could leave Dolon stormed into their area of the bullpen with all the unrestrained fury of a tropical cyclone.

"Have you had a break yet in locating Naomi Vaughn?" he asked, gruff and without preamble.

"Not yet," she admitted, but he didn't seem too interested in her answer.

"Where's Granger?"

"He went to the Bonaventure." Megan sidestepped the question.

He pointed to David, who'd attempted to busy himself with the FBI file for Naomi Vaughn. Dolon's eyes narrowed. "Sinclair's returned."

"Colby had a few things to wrap up with the hotel staff," she added.

"Then he was making a coffee run," David supplied. He shifted in his seat, uncomfortable with the half-truth.

"He should be back soon," she assured him. Hopefully.

"Call him for me?" Dolon asked Megan sharply. Almost as an afterthought added, "Please."

Megan tried not to let her eyes bulge as the man leaned against her desk and waited for her to carry out his request. "Uhh, sure." She set her purse down, reached for her desk phone, and quickly dialed Colby's number. It rang once, twice, again, and after the fourth tone the voice mail kicked in. Phone still up at her ear, listening to Colby's emotionless voice state he was away from his phone, she said, "It's gone straight to voic—"

Dolon motioned for her to hand him the phone. She offered it and he all but snatched it away. On pins and needles Megan watched as Dolon listened to the end of the recording. "Granger. This is Assistant Director Dolon. Report to the office as soon as you get this message. It is imperative that I speak with you." Dolon leaned into Megan's personal space and set the phone into its cradle.

"Perhaps his cell battery is dead?" Megan suggested. "We haven't had much chance to charge them lately."

"When he gets back I want to speak to him."

"I'll send him."

"Immediately." Dolon ordered and departed.

She looked to David and he shrugged. "He better return soon."

"I hope so."

"I'm not wild about what we just did."

"Me neither," she said and shouldered her purse for a second time. "But it was necessary."

"Was it?" he questioned.

"Do you care what kind of sandwich?" she asked, not about to ponder his philosophical question.

"Surprise me."

Megan wound her way through the labyrinth of office cubicles towards the elevator shaft. She punched the down arrow and waited for the car to reach the sixth floor. When the elevator doors opened Colby stepped out.

"Did you get Dolon's message?" she asked him.

"No, I've had my phone off." He reached into his pocket and turned it on. "You said the message is from Dolon?"

"Yeah, and he's about to lop off heads."

"Gotcha."

"Oh!" She'd nearly forgotten. Before she stepped into the waiting elevator she put her hand on Colby's shoulder. "Plug in your cell phone 'n charge it."

"Huh?" Colby asked confused. "It's charged."

"Just plug it in," Megan said and tilted her head in the direction of Dolon's office.

"Ahhhh," he drawled in understanding.

"Then go speak to Dolon. Quickly."

In the shrinking space between the closing elevator doors Megan watched as Colby walked away. He moved like a wounded warrior.

-oOo-

"Well, well, well. Isn't that interesting?" David mused as Megan returned from Sunshine's, hands full of brown paper bag. Colby had also returned from his private discussion with the Assistant Director and sat at his desk fidgeting with a pen as he pored over Claudia's preliminary reports.

"What'd you find?" Megan asked setting the bag of sandwiches, chips, and bottled water on her desk. She also stowed her purse in her desk drawer.

"Just a sec. Let me double check."

"Sure thing," she replied and started to unload the sandwich boxes and packages of chips onto her desk. "They were out of the BLT that you usually order," she mentioned to Colby.

"Don't worry about it. I'm not hungry," he said dismissively not bothering to look up from his reading.

"What did Dolon want?"

He marked his place on the page with his finger and looked up at her. "It was a short conversation. He wanted to know where Westwood disappeared to."

"Trouble in FBI-NSA relationship paradise?"

"Looks that way," he replied and returned to reading.

"Come and take a look at this," David interrupted them before Megan could return to the food issue.

David twisted around in his chair to face them. He lowered his voice, "Before you'd returned from driving Don home and Colby was still," his hand rolled in a come-on-you-know gesture, "not back. I called an ex-partner and asked her about what she knew of Dolon. Ter—"

"If she even so much as breathes a word, we're in deep trouble," Colby cut in, his expression pained.

Megan didn't think it was a terribly bright idea to involve anyone outside their core group, but she kept her mouth closed. Her two friends were still stewing in their own anger and since she told Don they'd need to talk it out, she better let them. Deliberately ignoring them she rooted the bottles of water out of the bag and put them next the food.

"She won't," David stated firmly.

"You can't be sure of that. Nobody can."

"Don't worry about it," David replied.

"I want you to appreciate the danger of the situation." Colby's already ragged patience was clearly fraying further.

"Charlie's gone. You think I don't?" David shot back.

"I think you should have told me before you involved anyone else."

"We've just covered for you with the Assistant Director and you want us to confirm every choice we make with you? You can't run this investigation as if you're God."

"I'm not…" Colby stuttered off guard. "David, you know me."

Neither David nor Colby saw it, but eyes and ears across the floor were starting to turn in their direction. Other agents, greedy for prime gossip fodder, started to slow as they passed their area. Colby's interrogation, arrest, and unprecedented release were stigmas he was going to have to live with for as long as he worked in the Bureau. A tarnished reputation would be deadly. Now that their continued argument was starting to draw attention from the nearby agents Megan would have no had no choice but to step in soon. Still, she hesitated, hoping she'd be more right than Don.

After a moment's pause David said, "No, I don't."

"How long is the fact that I didn't reveal a portion of my life to you gonna to stick in your craw?"

"I'd say a couple of days isn't all that long."

"Seems like this week has gone on for months," Colby muttered.

"If it'd been me I would have done things differently, that's all I'm saying."

Was she being too squeamish in bringing the hammer down upon them? She saw them more as friends and colleagues instead of subordinates, so the answer was yes. Stalling for a moment longer, she unscrewed one of the bottles of water and took a swing of cold water.

Colby's smile twisted. "Be careful what you wish for, David."

Megan pulled in a deep breath and prayed she'd do half as decent job as Don would. "You two are arguing in circles," she stated firmly, putting the water bottle on her desk with a thump.

Both men jerked up at the sound of her voice as if they'd forgotten she was there. They probably had. "This is not the place. I'm the one running this investigation. Remember?" They had the decency to look a little bit guilty. "Whether it be choice or chance, what's done is done," she continued. "David, do you really trust this person?"

"Don would trust her," David assured her.

"This isn't about trust," Colby muttered. Megan bit her lip to keep from screaming at the top of her lungs.

"Yes it is," David countered. "Either you trust us, or you don't. Either we do this, or we don't. This can't work any other way."

Megan watched as anger, frustration, and finally resignation played across Colby's face. She stopped worrying her lip when he swallowed and nodded curtly.

Colby backed away and sunk into his desk chair across the way. "I'm sorry, I keep falling back into old patterns," he admitted.

"Go on, then," Megan urged David. "What did you find?"

"I called Terry Lake to tell her about Charlie because she'd have liked to have known. And then I asked—I didn't tell her any of what we suspected—if she knew anything about an NSA agent named Markenson. And then because he's out here I asked about Dolon too. She's in D.C. It's a small world."

"You figured we could use the grapevine instead of having it use us," Megan said wryly.

"Exactly."

"She'd never heard of Markenson and I specifically didn't mention Westwood," David made a point of telling Colby. "Her impression of Dolon was illuminating. Seems he's not in the Director's or the Deputy Director's good graces at the moment. His abrupt departure to come out here also raised more than a few eyebrows. I mentioned the phone call conversation because it got me thinking about his past and how he advanced to the top of food chain.

"For the past hour I've been reviewing some of the information about Naomi Vaughn we wouldn't have been interested in when we took her into private custody last Friday. This is a list of her past residences." Megan and came up behind David and peered at his computer screen. The list of residences was long: Baltimore, Maryland; Alexandria, Virginia; New Delhi, India; London, England; Boston, Massachusetts; New York, New York; Chicago, Illinois; Freetown, Sierra Leone; Washington, D.C.; Los Angeles, California. "She's moved around a lot, but this was what caught my eye." David tapped his finger on the screen on top of the words Alexandria and Virginia.

"I'm not following," Megan admitted. A quick glance at Colby showed he was just as perplexed, brow furrowed. He wasn't making any sense of David's find either.

David toggled the information displayed on his screen and the profile of Naomi Jennifer Vaughn was replaced by one of Michael Arthur Dolon. "The Assistant Director also lived in Alexandria, Virginia at the same address for a period of several months fifteen years ago."

"When?" Colby asked leaning forward in his chair.

"May '92 to December '92. I've double and tripled checked the dates and addresses. They match," David asserted.

Colby whistled through his teeth.

In the past two conversations Megan had had with Dolon the first thing out of his mouth had been to ask about Naomi Vaughn. A long lost love in danger would cloud one's emotions. "If they had a personal relationship that explains why the Assistant Director ordered Don to have us keep her quiet," Megan deduced aloud.

"And why he's been on edge since she was taken," David added.

"Don't be so sure about that. Can I take a look?" Colby asked and got up to examine the data David had on his screen. Obliging him David scooted to the left.

Over on her desk Megan's cell started to ring shrilly. "Megan Reeves," she said answering her phone.

"Megan, can you talk?" Don asked on the other end.

"Don," she said trying not to let exasperation seep in. Both David and Colby looked over their shoulders. "I promised I'd call if we had news."

"I know," he admitted. "It just that when I got home I found—"

"We're in the middle of something right now," she cut him off. "I don't have time to talk."

"Will you _listen_ to me?" Don nearly yelled, frustrated.

In the background she could hear several excited voices talking over each other. "Do I hear Larry in the background?"

"You do," he confirmed. "I'd put him on if you'd be more receptive to him."

Her stomach growled again. "That's not necessary."

"Thank you. I know you're busy, so I'll be quick. Ashby sent me a letter and a disk at the house. Stupid that I didn't open it earlier, things might be different if I'd've…." Don trailed off realizing that he was starting to ramble. He cleared his throat and started over. "Amita has just started to decrypt some of the data we've found on the disk. You three need to see it. He's left us another message and another code."

"Another code?" Megan grabbed the edge of her desk for support.

"Yeah."

"Alright," she sighed, "it'll take us a few hours, but we'll get over there as soon as possible."

"That's all I ask," Don said.

"See you soon," she replied and he cut the connection.

"What was that about?" David asked her as soon as she'd snapped her phone shut.

"Ashby sent Don a letter," she said and then recapped the rest of their brief conversation. "I told him we'd come over as soon as possible," she concluded.

David nodded. "It'll also be a good time to talk about the things we can't talk about here."

Colby grunted his agreement, but he was more focused on Naomi Vaughn's file. Megan watched Colby take his jittery hands and ball them into fists.

Nobody seemed eager to continue the conversation so Megan broke the silence with a safe topic. "David, is your surprise going to be ham and swiss, chicken salad, or turkey?" she asked, holding up each sandwich box as she named them.

"Ham."

She handed him the box lunch. "Colby?"

"I snagged something while I was out. I'm fine." Colby said, but slid his eyes away from her and back to David's computer before he'd finished speaking.

"You sure?"

"I'm sure. I'm not all that hungry."

She didn't believe him for a split second, but didn't push it. Megan removed the chicken salad sandwich from its wrappings and David opened his bag of chips. "So," David said around a mouthful of Sun Chips, "it looks like Dolon has a personal interest in assuring Naomi Vaughn is recovered alive."

"I'd imagine so," Megan said and then took a bite of her own lunch.

"No, he wants her dead," Colby said. The words were hushed, but he brokered no opposition.

She choked on her sandwich and coughed. He couldn't be serious!

"You can't know that for sure," David stated as Megan tried to soothe her coughs with a fresh swallow of water.

"What'd you think my conversation with him was about?" Turning away from them Colby left for the safety of the kitchen. "I'm gonna brew another pot of coffee."

-oOo-


	11. Fairytale Time

** Chapter XI: Fairytale Time **

Charlie woke with a crick in his neck. He'd waited a long, long time before sleep—dreamless and deep—claimed him. Sleep had skewed his sense of time, but he certainly didn't feel well rested. Gingerly lifting his arm, he tried to check his watch. Seeing only his bare wrist Charlie remembered that he'd taken it off after dinner the night before. It could be early morning or mid afternoon for all he knew.

Rubbing his eyes, he lifted his head off of Naomi's shoulder and eased away from her. They hadn't spoken much after he'd finished throwing up. She'd led him back to the bed as it was the only place to sit. He'd let himself be led, had even laid down beside Naomi at her urging, but he hadn't slipped into sleep easily.

At least it didn't hurt to look directly at the bedside lamp anymore. That was a small mercy, but mercy all the same. Neither he nor Naomi had even suggested turning it off and now it still cast a warm glow throughout the room. There was protection in the light.

Thank god for the light!

They'd taken what little comfort they could in it and in each other's unsteady breathing.

Charlie had been sure—so sure—Don would burst though the door, rescue them, and make this nightmare disappear. If he waited just one more moment, just one more breath, then it would happen. Just one more.

Don never came.

Maybe Don had tried. And failed. And gotten himself killed. Don't think about that. Don't! Don't make it real. Don't think about Don or Dad.

Dad….

Charlie's heart bottomed out. He'd been so wrapped up in himself he'd avoided thinking about his father. As they'd hauled him to the van, he hadn't heard a shot and he was going to cling to that until he knew differently.

He had to.

Maybe that's why Don didn't come. Dad was dead, Don was dead, he was next, and….

Stop!

Charlie swung his legs over the side of the bed in an attempt to try to banish his morbid thoughts. His body creaked and the bedsprings squeaked as he moved, but Naomi continued to sleep on, her eyes busy under her eyelids. She wasn't what he had expected.

Was she what Colby had expected?

It was a cruel joke on them all to spare her, only to be kidnapped. Kidnapped. The word alone made it seem like he was six years old.

A chill raced up his spine and Charlie felt inexplicably cold. To combat the feeling he wrapped his arms about himself. His right arm and shoulder moved fine, but when he tried to roll his left shoulder—fucking hell!—it sparked stinging rivers of pain that slammed into his fingertips. How easy that movement was twelve hours ago; he'd gone from rocks to shocks. The sensation made his eyes water.

He refused to cry. He was a fully grown adult and he _refused_.

Blinking the tears away, he eyed both of his hands. From a simple visual inspection they appeared to be identical opposites, but appearances are deceiving; the left hand felt off—stiffer, darker, slower, wrong.

Then he realized that it was subtle, but his whole left side felt that way. Gulping, he took stock of the rest of his body: his mouth tasted like skunk, the room wasn't spinning, his vision was only fuzzy on the edges, his head ached, he was hungry, and his bladder was on the verge of bursting.

Well, his bladder was something he could take care of. He hobbled towards the bathroom. He held his breath, but could still smell the stench of vomit. It took two fumbling tries to undo his pants, but he was able to relieve himself without major incident.

Finished, he flushed the toilet, tidied up, turned on the tap, and rinsed his hands in the basin. Wiping his hands dry on his thighs, he looked up into the tiny mirror above the sink. Its surface was foggy with grime, but he could still see himself though the dim light and shadows cast from the bedside lamp.

He didn't recognize the man who frowned back; the stranger had the audacity to blink at the same time he did. Circles ringed his eyes, a gash slashed from temple to ear on his right side, and dried blood dyed his hair.

What had he become?

A dizzy spell forced Charlie to put his good hand against the brick wall for balance. Who would want to save him now? Maybe Don had decided not to come. What if—

The bathroom suddenly seemed way too small. He had to get out.

Now!

Panicked, he staggered drunk-like towards the bed, towards Naomi, towards safety. He tried to crawl up the bed, but regretted it when the pain in his arm forced him to collapse. The instant he landed in a heap Naomi jerked awake.

She bolted up, brown eyes wild. All of his fears were echoed in her expression.

It was too much. He hadn't made this bed, but he couldn't do anything but lay in it. His breath hitched and he felt the inevitable tears start to sting. "He didn't come," Charlie choked out, letting the tears stain his cheeks.

"Who didn't come?" she asked.

"We fought." Then there were more tears. He couldn't stop them and there didn't seem to be any point in holding them in.

"Shhhhh," she hushed. She reached out for his right hand. He clutched it like a buoy in a storm. "Who're you talking about?"

"I told him that I could handle things myself, that I knew what I was getting into. So, what if…." he trailed off. What if? What if? What if? He was nearly hysterical. He knew it couldn't be true, shouldn't be true but what if…. A new pit opened up in the depths of his stomach. "He's left me all alone."

"That's not true."

"It is. It is!"

"No, it's not. I'm here." She was something he could cling to no matter how bad it would get. They were in this together. "I'm right here." She let him cry himself out just like she had let him heave himself empty the night prior.

"Sorry," he whispered once he'd regained some semblance of control.

"Don't be. I wasn't having that good of a dream."

He sniffed, but didn't wipe the tears away. He didn't trust his left hand and he didn't want to let go of her with his right. "I'm not normally this neurotic."

"I'm not normally this motherly," she replied.

"That makes us even."

She smiled at that, her eyes glassy-wet. "Feel any better now?"

"Yeah," he said automatically and then changed his mind. "No, not really."

"Who didn't come?" she asked again, gently.

"Don."

"Ahhh," she said, understanding rich in her voice. "You expected your brother to come and rescue us."

He nodded. "He always has before." Always. From childhood baseball bullies to mob hardened criminals. Don was as invincible as a superhero.

"Then why would you think otherwise now?"

"Because…." He floundered for words to explain his emotions that had seemed so overwhelming a few minutes ago. They were on the tip of his tongue, but wouldn't form. Superheroes don't give up on their family, even during a fight. "Perhaps I'm being irrational."

"That's allowed."

"Is it?" he asked weakly. He studied the plain, white cotton sheet because it wasn't as overwhelming as her gaze. "You don't think less of me?"

"Why would I?"

"'Cause I just lost it."

"You didn't see me in the hours I was alone." She continued after a brief pause, "I think we're sleep deprived, half starved, injured, and afraid. I'm willing to cut you some slack, if you'll grant me the same."

He squeezed her hand this time. "That's a deal."

"It must be nice to have a big, older brother who you've always known will protect you." There was a wistfulness in her voice that made Charlie feel insanely lucky.

"You don't?"

"Only child," she revealed. "My mother died when I was little."

"And your father?"

"Wasn't the best of men."

"Oh," he said lamely, reading between the lines.

She shrugged into the mattress. "I cut him out of my life as soon as I was able."

"What about a boyfriend? Husband?"

"Once, but not now, not anymore."

"Divorced?"

"He was older," she confirmed. "I was young and foolish and it ended as quickly as it started. Suffice it to say I don't believe in fairytale romance."

"But you did?"

"Growing up?" She shook her head. "No, I was drawn more to myth and legend than Disney and princesses."

"Which legends?" Charlie asked genuinely interested.

"What, are we playing twenty questions here?"

"I don't have anything better to do. Do you?"

"Not really," she agreed, slipping her hand out of his grip. She curled her hand against her belly and rubbed slowly. "Anything to do with Avalon, mainly. Are you going to ask what my favorite color is next?" she joked.

"I won't. However, just to be sure, you should ask me something instead."

"Okay," she said and smiled weakly. "What's your favorite movie?"

That was a simple answer. "My Big Fat Greek Wedding." Naomi had a puzzled look on her face like one of his students in way over their head. "That's not what you were expecting, was it?"

Her lips twitched in silent laughter. "Not even close. I'd pegged you as A Beautiful Mind type of guy."

"Most would. I live the life of a brilliant mathematician helping the government, so I don't need it enacted for me. Besides, it was slightly odd watching a movie about a man I've met and who I know read some of my early work." Charlie picked up the edge of the bed sheet and flicked the worn fabric between his thumb and forefinger. "My Big Fat Greek Wedding was the last movie I saw with my mother."

"Last movie?"

"Cancer," he said simply, dropping the sheet and smoothing it out on the bed. He'd seen a review in the newspaper and known she'd love it. He also figured it would be something he could sit though. They'd gone together on a Friday night just like they always use to during his time at Princeton. During the movie and dinner afterwards they had both forgotten she was sick; they were a mother and son out and about enjoying life.

"It's your turn to ask me a question," she reminded him.

He cleared his throat. "What's your favorite book?"

"To Kill a Mockingbird."

"Why?"

"It's a story about the loss of innocence and discovering that people aren't necessarily who you think they are. And with what you've told me about Agent Granger," she blew his name out with a sigh and rolled onto her back, "it seems I've forgotten that myself."

"That's hardly your fault."

"Does it really matter who's to blame?" she asked him.

"In the grand scheme of things, it probably doesn't."

"What's he like?" she asked the ceiling.

"Who, Colby?"

"Mmm hum."

"He's…." Who was Colby Granger? The first time he'd heard Colby's name it was joined with a curse. Don had been downing a beer and blowing off steam about how his new rookie was having difficulty getting along with David. What else did he know about the man? "He grew up in Idaho. He fought in Afghanistan with the Army Special Forces. He plays chess." That was just the surface because he'd kept lots of his life hidden. Reading his classified file had been a revelation: spying, Falcon's Blessing, and China. "Above all he's a friend."

He let her digest that.

"Why'd you become a mathematician?" she asked after a long, quiet moment.

Charlie accepted the subject change without comment. "I didn't."

"You said you were one two minutes ago."

"A mathematician wasn't something that I could become because it was something I always was."

"Even when you were little?" she asked, skepticism in her voice.

"Especially then." It was nice to talk with someone who didn't automatically think of him as a prodigy. Vomit and crying jags must have been good for something. If anything it turned him into a mortal man.

"What do you see yourself as then?"

"A teacher. I have answers and people come to me. I like learning. I like math. I like passing on what I know. It's rewarding to see a student grasp, really truly understand, a concept for the first time. Why'd you become a reporter?" he asked.

"Almost the same reason you teach. So other people will learn a little bit of what I know," she propped herself up on an elbow and elaborated. "I went into journalism because when things are written down they become record. Those words say I was here and I remember. Ink and paper are black and white, but stories I tell span all the colors in between. I publish something and it's the prism with which people form their own interpretation. I don't seek out sensational stories because I want to trash the powerful. I seek out stories that shouldn't be hidden and shouldn't be forgotten. My work's gotten me into trouble over the years, but I can't control what people do with my words."

"I understand," Charlie said. He thought of telling Don that Ashby named Colby a spy and of Victor Westwood standing on his porch. Both wanted his help and Charlie gave it, but he couldn't control what they did with the knowledge he gave them. He'd gotten more than he'd bargained for. Both times. "I can't control what people do with my work either."

"Seems like we're doomed to be misunderstood no matter if we're speaking in words or if we're speaking in numbers," she said wryly.

"I can't spell to save my soul," he confessed.

"I haven't misspelled a word in ten years."

"You write for a living. I wouldn't expect anything less."

"True." She squeezed her eyes shut and pressed her hand against her belly again.

"Are you okay?" Charlie asked, concerned.

"Magenta," she replied.

"Huh?"

"My favorite color," she responded, standing up and making her way to the small bathroom. "I'll be back in a sec." She shut the door behind her.

"Mine's grey," he muttered to the empty room.

What was that all about? He waited and when five minutes stretched into ten Charlie got up and rapped on the door with his knuckles. "Naomi?"

"Give me a moment," she called back, voice muffed through the door. A second later he heard the flush of the toilet and the gurgle of tap water as she washed her hands.

When she opened the door she didn't meet his eyes. "I'm fine," she said unconvincingly.

"Are you sure?"

She nodded. "Do you think we can strip the bed?"

"Whatever for?"

"I was hoping you weren't going to ask that," she muttered and sunk down on the bed. "Do you have a girlfriend?"

"Yes, Amita."

"And are there times when Amita watches girly movies and craves chocolate?"

"She likes dark chocolate," he replied and sat next to her. "I'm still not getting—"

"You're a smart man, Charlie. Are there times of the month when she isn't in the mood?"

"Oh!" He felt his eyes bug out. "You're… you're… you're, you know.…"

"In a bit of a bloody predicament."

Please let her be kidding. Please. "There isn't anything in the bathroom you can use?"

"There's precious little toilet tissue and I'd rather not use the pillowcase from last night. It's wet and it's—"

"Not exactly hygienic anymore," he finished for her. "You want to use the sheet?"

"I figure that the sheet's old and warn enough that it shouldn't be too hard to rip off a piece that I can use."

"Okay, let's do it."

"Thank you." Then she paused cocking her head sideways.

He was starting to be unnerved. "What?"

"Is it wrong that I can find a small amount of humor in how quickly your face blanched?"

Now he was sure he was blushing. "Yes," he said as solemnly as he could manage while he got up and went to untuck the blasted sheet from the right side of the bed.

She did laugh at him then. "If I don't laugh then I think I'll cry."

"I've cried enough for the both of us."

"If you're not careful then I might just nickname you Sheets."

He grumbled, but let her laugh. Charlie had pulled his side free from the mattress when he heard heavy footsteps and muffled voices outside. Both of them stopped cold.

"What should we do?" he whispered.

"Sit," she hissed back.

They scrambled onto the bed and Charlie made sure that he was between Naomi and the door. He schooled his expression as much as possible before it opened.

Three men entered.

The first two were thick and thuggish. The Black Rain henchmen took up stations on either side of the door and made no attempt to hide the fact they were armed to the teeth. Were these the men responsible for beating him and drugging him? Charlie made it a point to look in their chilling eyes.

The third man had a smaller stature and unlike the Caucasian guards he was Chinese. He was undoubtedly in command and upon entering he gave a small bow. "My name is Ta-Ming Wang."

Out of reflex Charlie inclined his head in greeting. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Naomi do the same.

"What do you want?" Charlie asked hoarsely. He couldn't help but stare out into the hallway through the wide open door. Freedom was close at hand, but very far away. He'd be dead before he crossed the threshold.

"Come here." Wang addressed Charlie.

Against his better judgment, Charlie stood. With the guards standing by, it's not like he really had a choice in the matter. It was a blessing his legs didn't shake.

Once Charlie stood before him Wang licked his lips and smiled softly. He took Charlie's uninjured hand in his. "You have a beautiful hand." The man tuned his hand over, so Charlie's vulnerable palm faced up. He drew his fingers over the crisscross of lines he found there.

It was a horrible, tickling-soft touch. Now both of his hands felt wrong, felt cloaked in darkness.

"You have information I want," Wang announced.

"We don't know anything."

"We will see." Wang brought Charlie's hand up to his lips and kissed it before he dropped it. Charlie tried and failed to suppress a shudder. Then in a very cold voice Wang said: "Lights."

At his command one of the henchmen went into action. He strolled, as casual as you please, into the bathroom and emerged a few moments later with the light bulb from the bathroom. Charlie heard Naomi's gasp. The guard handed Wang the bulb on his way back to his former post.

Wang held it directly in front of Charlie and offered it to him. Like a fool Charlie reached for it, but Wang snatched it away before he even got close enough to touch it.

"I don't know what you want," Charlie pleaded.

Without a word Wang pointed to the bedside lamp. The other guard reached for it and when the lamp was unplugged the room plunged into darkness. A slanted ray from the hallway was the only illumination. It was dim and weak, much like the hope in Charlie's heart.

"You will have to figure out what will please me," Wang said. Then as quickly as they had entered all three exited. When the door clanged shut it was dark, so very dark.

"Naomi?" Charlie called out, blind.

"I'm here."

He blinked back fresh tears. "Can I still believe in fairytales?"

"Tell me one now," she urged.

"Once upon… a time… there…" he faltered and then stopped, unable to continue.

She cleared her throat and picked up his thread. "Once upon a time, there was a mathematician, a journalist, and a list."

He followed her voice towards where he knew the bed was. "How does the story end?"

"Your brother will come before that happens," she said firmly.

"He'll come," Charlie echoed. He didn't care if this whole tale was a lie. He needed to believe it and he wouldn't imagine any other possibility, permutation, or combination. "He'll come."

-oOo-

Don opened the door when Megan knocked. The first words out of his mouth weren't a greeting to her, but a growl for David. "You told Terry."

"She'd've wanted to know," David replied as she and Colby shuffled inside.

"I was going to tell her."

"But did you?" David responded. No remorse. No guilt. "I thought it would help to talk with a friend."

"It did." No reproach. No apology.

And with that Don closed the door behind them. Why was it men had such a hard time thanking each other sometimes? They dance around the topic when what they really mean to say is _thank you_.

"Do you have any solid leads?" Don asked.

"Do we have to have this discussion in the foyer?" Colby said curtly.

"Colby," Megan cautioned. She knew he'd been on edge since learning about Naomi Vaughn and Michael Dolon's marriage and she didn't want him to take anything out on Don. Especially now.

"No, no," Don said. "It's alright. Everyone's upstairs. We've been working upstairs in the solarium. Ashby's letter's up there too and I want you to see that." No one commented on the fact that the garage was out of bounds.

Don led his team—no matter the circumstances they were his team—to the stairs and they ascended.

As Megan put her left foot on the first stair, Alan stuck his head out of the kitchen briefly. "I'll have food ready in 'bout a half an hour," he called and ducked back into the kitchen.

"There'll be coffee too, won't there?" Colby asked continuing to climb.

"Sure thing," Don replied. "Millie brewed a pot earlier. I bet there's some left upstairs."

"Good." Colby was gruff.

David, concerned, met Megan's gaze. Both were thinking the same thing: Colby should be kept far, far away from any additional caffeine. Over the course of the afternoon he'd had at least seven cups of coffee—she knew because she'd counted—and none of it accompanied by food. Colby was wired and wound even tighter. She was going to do everything in her power to make sure he had a full, healthy meal instead of more coffee.

She had her hands full of more than just FBI documents and memos, that was for darn sure.

In the solarium, Amita was hunched over a laptop typing. Larry and Millie were off to the side standing before two large blackboards, which had probably been taken from the garage. Millie waved hello and Larry drew Megan into a hug.

"Missed you," Megan said into his shoulder.

"Me too," Larry replied and then pulled away. "We're in the middle of a train of thought." He indicated the chalked signs and symbols covering the blackboard. Megan thought them just as unintelligible as ever.

"Go, go work," she urged him. "A train's a train."

Without further preamble Don handed Megan a bundle of papers and an envelope. "Ashby's letter."

She set down her files on the table next to Amita and leafed through the blank pages—odd that there were so many of them—and read the note. David skimmed it over her shoulder while Colby took a seat on the sofa.

"Who is Epimetheus?" Megan asked the room at large.

"A Greek Titan whose wife was Pandora," Amita supplied, "but we think the note refers to a what not a who because Epimetheus is also one of Saturn's moons. Like Janus."

"Pandora!" Colby exclaimed, stunned.

"You know something?" Don asked him.

"I met today with Chinese Consul Chen."

"He's who we watched Carter contact?" Don asked with a frown.

"Yes, he has generously offered me safe harbor on Chinese soil."

"In exchange for the Janus List?"

"No," Colby rose from the sofa and started to pace. "In exchange for all information on a military operation named Pandora," he stressed the code name, "which was activated in November of 1992. I was ordered to provide the List for Chen, but he had no interest in it."

"Ordered by whom?" Don was hard, too hard. However, Colby had been cosseted enough. Perhaps it would take steel to bring him out of his shell.

"Michael Dolon and Victor Westwood." Colby stopped pacing in front of the window and let everyone absorb the names.

"How long have you been working for them?" David asked.

Colby didn't bother to turn around. "Every minute I've known you."

Don broke the tension and asked, "Did Chen offer you anything else?"

"Yes."

"What?"

"A young woman." From his mood it was clear he sure didn't take her.

"Who was she?"

"I didn't exactly get a name."

"What'd she look like?"

"Don," Colby pleaded. "She was a bribe. I didn't sleep with her. She doesn't have anything to do with anything."

"You sure had woman throwing themselves at you today," David commented cynically.

Colby rounded on David. "I'm trying to explain what happened today and you go there?"

"Go where?" Megan asked, trying to ease the strain.

"We played good cop, bad cop at the Bonaventure Hotel," David explained while Colby dropped back onto the sofa.

"Who was the good cop?" Amita asked, pausing from writing her code, and bit her lip to restrain a grin.

"I was." Colby said, offended. He put his head in his hands and sighed.

"Good cop, my eye," Megan muttered under her breath. "This couldn't have been the first thing the Chen has had this woman do," she stated aloud.

"I doubt it," Colby agreed.

Don crossed his arms across his chest, broking no argument. "Describe her then."

"I close my eyes,"—he did so and leaned his head back onto the couch—"and can see her perfectly, but I wouldn't trust a professional sketch artist, right now," Colby replied. "Can I get some coffee?" he asked, changing the subject. "Millie, Don said you had coffee."

"God damn it, Granger!" Megan slammed her hand on the table, suddenly furious.

Everyone, except for Larry, jumped. "Is your hand alright?" he asked, full of zen and concern.

"It's fine," she spat, ignoring the pain. It was time to force the issue. "How much coffee have you had today? Do you even know?"

"What does it matter?" he asked. "It's only coffee. Look, what would you have me do? They have my balls in a vice grip! I make a wrong move and I'm as dead as Markenson."

"You've got to trust us, Colby, or this is for nothing." Megan pounded her hand on the table again. Nobody moved. Nobody breathed.

That hit home. "Trust and trade," he said slowly. "I seem to keep coming back to that. Who else would you have me trust?"

"Larry could sketch her," Amita suggested, closing the laptop's lid.

Larry held up both his hands in a sign of surrender. "I don't think—"

"You're the best artist we've got," Megan said. "Let's get you some paper and a pencil."

In short order David furnished fresh paper from the printer and Millie dug up a handful of sharpened yellow number two pencils. Both Larry and Colby were installed at the table in the space Amita vacated.

"What am I drawing?"

"She was Asian—Chinese," Colby began. "She was slender, about five feet tall, had high cheek bones, and a pert nose."

"Like this?" Larry made a quick sketch of a nose. "Or this."

"More like the second one, but not as straight, here." Colby pointed to the bridge of her nose and everyone peered intently at the drawing.

"Feel like you're in a fishbowl?" Amita asked when she saw Larry's glare.

"Charles' koi don't suffer from performance anxiety." Larry made another attempt.

"That's closer," Colby said. "Her eyes were almond shaped. They weren't close together or wide set."

Everyone in the room tried not to watch as Larry sketched a few different pairs of eyes for Colby's inspection. "Megan," Don said drawing her aside. "You're going to want to put something on your hand."

"You're one to talk," she retorted. "I seem to remember your fist coming into contact with a chalkboard not too long ago."

"And it still hurts," he said. "Don't be as stupid as I was. Go put some ice on it."

She grumbled, but gave in when Don pointed to the door. Her left hand tucked protectively against her chest, Megan descended to the kitchen. She stopped short as she entered to find Alan staring blindly into the open refrigerator clutching a bottle of lemon juice. Water from the faucet also gushed down the kitchen sink's drain. Down. Down. Down. Nowhere to go but down.

"Alan?" Megan asked tentatively.

Alan jerked and looked guilty. "Dinner's nearly done," he replied, gesturing to the oven and letting the refrigerator door shut of its own accord. "I'm just…" he put the lemon juice on the counter next to the sink. "Just tidying up," he lied and shut the water off.

She'd never seen the Eppes' kitchen in such a state before. Carrot and cucumber skin shavings stuck to the sides of the sink, empty jars of Prego lined the granite countertop, an empty package of manicotti noodles had missed the recycle bin, a frying pan with left over ground beef and grease sat on the stove, and the pullout breadboard had remnants of shredded mozzarella cheese stuck to it. The dishwasher, filled with dirty dishes, gaped open and half the cupboard cabinets were flung open. Herbs and spices—oregano, basil, sage, and thyme—littered the ground and scented the air.

If it was an attempt to organize dinner, it came out in disarray. In all the confusion this must be like hell on earth for Alan.

"I didn't come to hurry you along," she assured him, eying the salad bowls, glasses, plates, napkins, and silverware stacked to the side near the dining room. "I came to get some ice." She held out her hand, flesh still discolored red, for his inspection.

Grateful for something to do, Alan turned away and rummaged through a pull-out drawer for a Ziploc baggie. "I'll get you some."

"You don't need—"

"I'm happy to," he cut her off. His smile was forced but genuine and Megan realized that he needed to be useful, needed to provide for the team. It was all he had left to give.

Megan leaned against the counter, making sure to avoid a lump of wayward cottage cheese, and allowed him to fill the bag one by one with ice cubes. He sealed it shut with the fluid motion that only a father—nursing boys' bumps and bruises—could acquire.

"Do you have a salad dressing choice?" he asked holding the Ziploc out to her. "That's what I was trying to decide before you startled me." It may have started as an innocent trip to the refrigerator, but she was willing to bet good money that he'd gotten stuck and had started wallowing in misery. "I was thinking of a homemade citrus salad dressing."

"What are we having for dinner?" she asked, accepting the ice. Whatever rage and hurt she felt, it paled in comparison to what he must feel.

"Manicotti, garlic bread, and tossed salad. I figured it was filling and people could eat as much as they like." He grabbed the lemon juice and shook it vigorously, the liquid sloshed merrily.

"Smart of you."

"Actually, it should be done now." Alan opened the oven door and maybe it was her imagination, but the room felt a tad bit warmer. Then again she did have freezing blocks of ice on her skin. Any hint of warmth would make her feel better. Alan pulled on an oven mitt and slid the rack out to reveal three casserole dishes and a foil wrapped loaf of bread. He took one of the dishes out and set it on the counter. It held noodles, bubbling red sauce, and gooey melted cheese.

"That smells divine," Megan said as he took the bread and the other two dishes out and closed the oven.

"It's been a favorite of—" he bit off Charlie's name. "It's been a family favorite for years. You never answered. Does citrus dressing sound good to you?" He took off the mitt and picked up the lemon juice again. "I have oil and honey around here somewhere too." He went to the pantry hand hauled out the necessary ingredients. "Most of the spices are already out. Sage would be good," he prattled on. "Or thyme. Maybe marjoram, it's usually underused nowadays."

"Alan."

"Yes?"

"I slammed my hand against the table in the solarium because I'm angry and frustrated. Those aren't forbidden emotions."

His food enthusiasm faded as she waited him out. He cleared an empty spot on the counter and set the lemon juice, honey, and extra virgin olive oil down slowly. "I'm not fooling you, am I?"

"You shouldn't need to."

"I'm trying to kid myself too." He sighed, accepting the truth of his words. "We aren't going to crack this case with lemon juice, are we?"

"Nope."

"With Margaret we at least knew what was coming. There were doctors, there was a diagnosis, and then we knew—even if it was horrible—what to expect."

"And here you don't?" Megan asked, adjusting the ice.

"There are too many unanswered questions. When Donnie came home earlier, I'd never seen his eyes so hollow. He'd gone to get answers and came back empty. There wasn't anything he could tell us and we kept asking and asking and asking. Then he opened Ashby's letter and everyone launched into overdrive."

"Everyone except you."

He nodded. "It's just that… that you all have something you can do to help find Charlie, or unravel this mystery. You, Colby, David, and Don have FBI training you can fall back on. There's a case to solve. Amita, Larry, and Millie, they can keep their minds busy by attacking Ashby's latest riddle. But me? Look!" Alan pointed to the sink, the counter, the dishwasher, and then the floor. "Just look! It's a disaster. I can only make a mess in the kitchen."

"No," she corrected him, taking the ice off her now numb hand and setting it aside, "you made dinner in your kitchen. And that's important too."

"No, it's not." He sounded like a petulant two year old.

"How are we supposed to work if we aren't fed?"

"It's just food. You can get that anywhere."

"Food, yes. A family dinner with homemade salad dressing, no. Besides," she shrugged lightening the mood, "I'm quite sure Colby hasn't eaten anything all day. You and I are going to make sure he gets something healthy into his body."

"You think we're going to have to force feed him?" She saw him perk up at the idea of helping another man's son.

"God help us if it comes to that."

"You think it might?"

"Granger's hanging on by his willpower and a caffeine high."

"I'm going to have to change that," Alan said, gracing her with a sad, sad smile. "Megan, I'm glad you didn't try'n placate me by telling me you know this will have a happy ending."

"I wish I could, but you're right. There are too many unanswered questions, but we'll get you some answers. I promise. And in the meantime, I can help you make a fresh citrus salad dressing."

He reached for the sage and shook the small bottle. "That's sage advice, thank you."

Perhaps the ability to thank someone developed with age like a fine wine. She grabbed another spice. "Any thyme."

Despite the bad pun and the bad situation, they both chuckled.

-oOo-

**Author's Notes:** I hope the wait was worth it.


End file.
